Hidden behind screens in the Great Hall of Manchester town hall - while £325m refurbishment work continues - are a dozen Victorian masterpieces, which for a hundred or more years have been largely forgotten by the art establishment.
It's only now the full beauty and significance of these magnificent Victorian era works - which plot the story of Manchester since Roman times - are finally being appreciated, painting a picture of Manchester we might recognise today: radical, bolshy and unafraid to stand up the monied and powerful.
They are the work of Ford Madox Brown, the grandson of a Scottish labourer who defied his humble roots to forge a career as an artist. A new book about his life and work - and those stunning frescos hanging in Manchester town hall as refurbishments continue all around them - reveals he was an outspoken critic of the forces of wealth and power.
