Day 24 – Machynlleth – MOMA

Machynlleth has a small but impressive Museum of Modern Art with no less than five separate exhibitions including paintings, drawings on slate, photographs, and slate sculptures.

The museum is alongside The Tabernacle, a former Wesleyan chapel which opened as a centre for the performing arts in 1986.

The most impressive exhibit was about the quarrying and mining of slate in North Wales, in particular that which took place at nearby Corris and Aberllefenni. All production and exporting of slate from these sites would have passed through Machynlleth, initially to the Derwenlas and Aberdyfi and then later to the Cambrian Railway. This was ironic for me as I originally decided to come to Machynlleth to visit the Corris railway, but I was cancelled due to a shortage of volunteers on the railway. I visited anyway and watching the video was the next best thing. But I was most impressed by the works of Ceredigion-based sculptor Jon Evans, a slate carver who works with the high-grade slate still found at Aberllefenni. The pieces were beautiful and intricate. The accompanying photo is one of those carvings.

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