The Home in British Art 1950 – 1880

Local residents, asylum seekers and refugees helped to inform the curation this exhibition using memories and experiences to add to the richness of the experience. This exhibition gives a good feeling for post war Britain in the home. The work of women feels important. The mundane is revisited and given significance. It is relevant to my idea for this term’s work. Thinking of how we portray family and home and how it can be such an untruth at times. Thoughts about women and how they home-make at the expense often of themselves. Thoughts about men and how they express being a man in a domestic setting with paint brushes, lawn mowers, at home on their patch and then out bread-winning. This was my mother’s life. A talented house wife, mother and granny with a lost nursing career itch. No photos this time since it was not allowed.

I loved Paint Brushes 1973 by Jim Dine etching on paper. He used domestic and garden objects to illustrate life and toil through his body. Burnt Breakfast 1975 by Sue Richardson, A fried breakfast created in crochet – suggesting being fed up with the traditional women’s role in the kitchen. In the kitchen 1977 by Helen Chadwick Wonderful prints of women literally inside the kitchen – fabric utensils. Interior 1964 – 5 by Richard Hamilton, I thought this could be my mother, the figure admiring a new washing machine, only I don’t think she’d adore it but would appreciate its practicality after suffering first the galvanized wash tub with posh and mangle, then a single spin dryer, then the twin tub. Divided Self I, 1970, Jacqueline Morreau, even now this resonates. Mum never allowed herself to fully acknowledge the divisions she felt. Finally, Privacy Plots III:: Suburban Hedge, 1970, Ivor Abrams, Those privet hedges, what delights and tragedies go on behind them?

In the book corner. This is really great idea, a comfortable settee with books relating to the exhibition and opportunity to comment. A couple of books caught my attention. “The Feminist Uncanny in Theory and Art Practice” Alexandra M. Kokol (2016) and “Art and the Home: Comfort, Alienation and the Everyday” ” (2015) Imogen Racz.

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Most people answer this question in a comfortable way.