Unofficial War Artist: IWM

I have seen the Peter Kennard: Unofficial War Artist exhibition at the Imperial War Museum, London, several times with all sorts of people. First chatting around it with colleagues, then alone with a notebook preparing a tour, then as keen mum with my 18 year old son and finally talking and touring through the exhibition with visitors to the IWM.  

Peter Kennard's work is explicitly political. Politics of the left. "He has quite a bit to say about Bush and Blair", I forewarn American visitors. "And we will probably agree with him", they smile at me.

Age 19, as a student at the Slade school of art in 1968, the time of the anti Vietnam War protests, Kennard began to bring art and politics together producing a series of large gelatine prints, STOP. Talking about gelatine prints, a now defunct printing process, elicits a knowing nod from some older visitors.

Kennard took photos from current (at the time) newspapers of political events, and overlaid them with abstract marks. Taking familiar shocking and powerful images and making them unfamiliar and disorientating. Reflecting on this work and remembering those times, American visitors recognise and point out protests that happened back home.

Peter Kennard curated this exhibition alongside IWM curators. He made these boards specially to display an archive of his posters produced for different protest groups and organisations.

The exhibition includes an archive of Kennard's work from the 1970s, filling a whole room. It includes work he did as a student, experiments in sketchbooks, which I'm keen to point out to my newly-started-at-art-college son. "This is work he began at 19, you'll be 19 in 6 months time" I enthuse.

I had been nagging him to see the Peter Kennard exhibition as soon as I had seen it, even promising him the book. Not until, "mum, they (art college) have told us to see that exhibition where you work", did he agree to meet me and see it together.

"It's really good".

Exasperated... "Yes! I knew you'd like it, that's why I said come and see it".

I might be from another generation, but I get it.

Kennard was known for his photo-montages, a process that became associated with protest art. This was pre-digital, requiring scissors, knives and sellotape, prompting both political stirrings and affection for good old craft skills. 

Kennard's work provokes comment, causing visitors to speak their thoughts out loud, sometimes without meaning to.

Particularly this piece from 1982, using Constable's Haywain to comment on the missile base in East Anglia.

"He's a pacifist! But that's against everything the Imperial War Museum stands for! Why is he in an exhibition here?"

I don't think she meant to blurt this out as I was speaking but something just clicked. I explained that the IWM was not here to comment, but it has always been part of its remit to collect art to tell stories of war and conflict.

However, when you put objects in a museum they give off messages, intentionally or otherwise. Putting objects in a museum does kind of give them status that if you'd just left them rusting in the back of a garage they might not otherwise have had. But we all see things differently. For me, that cart looks so fragile under the weight of those cruise missiles. How fragile does life look under the threat of any missile?

Another visitor, "...ahead of his time, he saw that coming, the NHS." This was made in the 1980s.

"Getting the work out into the world and used is as important as its production", says Peter Kennard. Hence we see his work on badges and T-shirts as well as posters and pamphlets. 

What strikes you about Kennard's work is that you don't need a degree in art history to understand it. His images are readable, recognisable. This is not to make less of his work, to say that it is simple, but in fact to make more of his work. He asks questions, challenges the viewer, and gets you to think. In fact Peter Kennard doesn't call himself an artist, but a communicator. Like he says, he has got his "work out into the world", made it readable and understandable. Good communication.  

'Reading Room' is based on Kennards trips to Paddington Library as a child, to read the day's newspapers. People's faces photocopied onto financial pages from newspapers from around the world, unknown faces and stock market figures. A colleague and I find this moving, powerful. The faces are quite beautiful. What impact has the stock market had on their unknown lives? 

On the tour, I ask people to squeeze down a narrow corridor to look at  a series of paintings called 'Face'.

No-one minds the squash, not to contemplate these haunting faces. Faces that merge in and out of darkness, no mouths, no language, mute, therefore universally understood. Sometimes you don't need words.  

The last room in the exhibition has been made specially for it. A kind of mini retrospective of nearly 50 years of work. An installation where Kennard reflects on the financial and human cost of war.

'Boardroom' where Kennard brings us statistics on the handrail.

I spend time with my son reading these statistics. Some are not new.

"I knew that", but it still doesn't lessen the impact.

One visitor comments, "How long has this exhibition been here? He will have to update that now with the refugee crisis, ...perhaps on a daily basis."  

 "...and how many have been used. He should have said that."

This is an exhibition to make you think beyond the work. It has a been a privilege to see it with many different people, to have the opportunity to reflect on it with them and hear what they have to say. Not least was the opportunity to spend time with my 18 year old. It doesn't happen that much anymore, one to one, doing something we both enjoy.

Peter Kennard: Unofficial War Artist is free and is on at the Imperial War Museum, London until 30 May 2016. Free admission. See the Imperial War Museum website for gallery tours.

Take an 18 year old.

Face of Britain: National Portrait Gallery

Not all learning in museums is about the objects they display. In the museum learning literature it is acknowledged that people sometimes learn, "something new about each other"*. Never, for me, has this been so apparent than when I went with my dad to see Simon Schama's Face of Britain at the National Portrait Gallery. I'm in my late forties, you'd think I know him quite well by now.

As with the Grayson Perry exhibition, 'Who Are You?' at the National Portrait Gallery on last year, which you can read about here, Face of Britain is displayed over all three of the gallery's floors. My dad has been here before, he knows the form, he suggests taking the lift to the top and working our way down (the stairs). "Much easier that way."

Face of Britain looks at portraits and identity with five themes:

Power, Love, Fame, Self and People.

Power

Walking into the room, "that's Cromwell."

"How do you  know?"

"Cromwell, he is so distinctive, rugged, slightly nasty, I just know what he looks like."

I one the other hand, hadn't got a clue.

"Did you do history at school?"

"No, I hated history at school, bad teacher, it all depends on the teacher. I developed my interest in history after school." 

My dad went round the National Portrait Gallery identifying people. I wasn't expecting this, hearing all he knew about history, particularly impressed by him being able to identify Kings and Queens, and in the right order.

'Power', it kind of had to be... I didn't need my dad to tell me this was Margaret Thatcher.

"That makes her look softer than she was"

"...almost vulnerable looking."

"The only time she looked like that was when she was booted out."

This is when he dropped a bombshell. Never assume you know how your closest family vote.

"What! I can't believe it. I always thought you were a ..." I can't tell you how surprised I was.

Thatcher seemed to spark quite a bit of conversation, I couldn't help but overhear.

"Apparently she kept interfering with what the artist was doing."

 "Well that just about sums her up!"

The Queen. A 3D picture, a bit like one of those 3D postcards where things move. I had one where if you looked at it from different angles, giraffes moved their heads from side to side.

" I don't like it, her nose is pronounced too much."

I so wished it was one of those 3D moving pictures and she would open her eyes when stepped from side to side looking at her from different angles. It was not to be, this image was inspired by seeing the queen resting, a quick shut-eye between the official shots.

Here's another Elizabeth, the first.

No resting for her, she has a country to rule, painted under her feet, putting us firmly in our place.

Love

My dad proves to be a mine of information. he doesn't need to read the label to know this is is George, Prince of Wales, Prince Regent.

George, despite his "serial amorous adventures", had one true love, Maria Anne Fitzherbert (Mrs). When he died George was found with her portrait in miniature around his neck.

It was also love that prompted Sir Kenelm Digby to call quickly for Van Dyck to paint Lady Venetia Digby after he found her dead in bed. He lived with this portrait by his side, day and night, but it didn't manage to fully console him.

People

The "great and the good, ...characters".

Simon Weston, he is part of both our consciousness, memories of the 1980s and the Falklands War. 

Everyday people, from Torquay. It's near where my mum lives, I scan the photos to see if I recognise anywhere. I really don't. But am impressed with this "Torquay fishwife's" 'leg o'mutton' sleeves. What a great jacket.

These photos intrigue me. Surveillance photos of militant suffragettes, taken undercover while they were in prison. Imprisoned for damaging museum artefacts in the British Museum and the National Gallery. Their photos now hang in the National Portrait Gallery. So many questions, not least, how far would I go to stand up for women's rights? I am thankful for these women. 

Fame

I pause to take a photo to send to a friend via Facebook. We're playing a game. #GuessWho? 

My dad spots Nelson a mile off. I didn't realise how much of a celebrity Lady Emma Hamilton was. The mistress of one of the most famous people in Britain in the 18th century, she was "London's biggest female celebrity". Many of her portraits were reproduced in etchings to "provide the public with affordable portraits". Etchings, social media, has much changed?

Self

This is the "earliest known oil self-portrait painted in England". It's tiny. Painted whilst inprisoned at the Tower of London, Gerlach Flicke also painted his fellow cellmate, Henry Strangwish, who was in for piracy. 

Frank Auerbach. "very clever scribbles". Despite looking "scribbled", perhaps rushed, Auerbach worked on this painting for six years, continually rubbing bits out. Possibly a testament to that feeling of looking in the mirror and not really being happy at what you see.

Dame Laura Knight in her studio. I love this painting. She's there, hard at work in a life-drawing class, establishing herself as an artist, in a place where previously she had been barred, for being a woman.

David Bomberg, we read, went to the Slade school of art.

"Society of Lithographers, Artists, Designers and Engravers."

"No, not that Slade, the art college. But anyway, how do you know that?"

"My father was a member, a lithographer."

"I didn't know that, I only remember him retired."

"Yes he was a printer, worked in the Caledonian Road, Kings Cross. He was at the Woolwich Arsenal in 1940, getting ready to go to France in the Second World War, when he was told that he was not going because they needed him to be a forger, probably to help with the resistance. I don't know exactly what he worked on as he'd signed the official secrets act and never told his family. I've found all this out since he died."

"Gosh."

"He could raw a perfect circle free-hand."

This was my grandfather from an ordinary semi in Wembley. I had no idea. 

Simon Schama tells us that Face of Britain is about identity, portraits, discovering who people are. As well as learning about the illustrious on the walls of the National Portrait Gallery, I was thrilled to learn more about my family.

Simon Schama's Face of Britain is on at the National Portrait Gallery until 4th January 2016. Free admission. Details on their website here.  

Did you #GuessWho?

William Shakespeare

*Falk and Dierking, 1992

London Fire Brigade Museum

Last weekend was Open House London 2015 and a friend suggested we all go, he loves my kids. Open House London seeks to help people learn about buildings and architecture, those that have, "such a strong impact on us on an everyday basis". They say that photos and illustrations are not enough, we have to visit, get inside these buildings and get to know them and that includes museums.

So we did.

We went to the London Fire Brigade Museum.

At this point this trip could have gone one of two ways. Either very un-politically correct with 'who doesn't love a fireman', or down the geeky route with engines, water pressure, pumps and ladders. You will be pleased to know that it did just that, the geeky route; history, inventions and the development of firefighting. In some cases little has changed.

Despite what this 17th century Newsham pump looks like, this is high-tech, designed to pump and direct water down a leather hose to a specific point up to 40 feet away, the firefighters able to keep a safe distance.

This was manufactured for over 100 years and eventually they came in red. But you may have clocked that there's no ladder. In those days ladders and pumps were separate. Your buildings insurance paid for the fire service which was there to save buildings, not people. Noticing a bit of a problem here, charities paid for ladders to be added to fire engines in the 19th century. 

Eventually in 1969 we came to this, the Dennis F108.

Still red, a (manual) bell, flashing lights, ladders,

and 300 gallons of water on board.

With this on the back, a detachable ladder, handcrafted in wood.

Wooden cartwheels were in use until the 1980s.

 Producing firefighting equipment has required other artisan skills. Such as basket weaving used to make this filter, seen on this trailer pump used during the Second World War.

Wicker filters were made to filter the water from rivers, as often the mains were destroyed by bombing. Camouflaged in battleship grey, volunteers in the Auxiliary Fire Service could be trained to use these in just two hours.

We learnt all this from David, a retired firefighter who has a trailer pump at home. It still works and he takes it to shows and gives demonstrations. Here he is with a wheelbarrow pump. It's amazing what you learn when your engineer husband and friend keep him chatting for hours. How did they think to ask those questions? I was quite impressed with what they knew already.    

This was a museum in two halves. Engines in the appliance bay and the history of firefighting in Winchester House, the residence of the Brigade's Chief Fire Officer, Captain Eyre Massey Shaw who took charge of the Brigade in 1861 and is said to have begun the modern fire service.

Seeing this picture above I'm feeling slightly better about my un-political "nice firemen" quip. Looks like they've always had a somewhat pin-up status. Here Captain Massey features in Vanity Fair in their 'men of the day' section no less. A popular man, "he is, besides being the first fireman, one of the most popular men in London."

  

We look at uniforms, past and present.

A visitor, a firefighter, explains that the reflective visor is to reflect the heat. Of course! We feel a little foolish for not working that out for ourselves. 

Visitors are invited to try on uniforms. I was so pleased to see that these were not replica but the real thing. 'Real' is important in museums.

He was so desperate to fool people, standing stock still as I wandered into the room, but his height gave the game away a little. I have to say it wasn't just me he tried to fool, he stood like that for ages, hoping to trick other visitors. I moved on denying all responsibility.

We met another firefighter, another visitor, who explained this...

We never caught its name, but were seriously impressed with what it does. The red bag is attached to the fire firefighter and on entering a building with low visibility, you tie off the rope at intervals. When your air supply gets low, you have to get out. 

Finding the rope, you feel for the two knots, find the short knot, follow the rope and take the "short way" out. Clever! You abandon the bag and get out.

We saw women. Mrs J Hicks, Deputy Chief Woman Fire Officer, awarded an OBE for her services in the NFS in the Second World War. Having the word 'fire' in her job title was important, "as it gave weight to the fact that the women involved in the Brigade were not just involved in welfare and making the tea".

The Fire Service is not just reactionary but works hard to educate the public. They must do a good job as my daughter remembered this poster from a primary school visit and I'm pleased, yet slightly alarmed, to learn that from age seven she has had a 'Fire Plan' in place with her emergency escape route sorted. She's twelve.

"Don't you have have an escape route? If I coudn't get out through my bedroom door, well you know that little roof, I'd open my window and jump on that."
She is the most organised in our family. 

Meanwhile I worry about the toaster and electric shower, not to mention the vacuum cleaner (not shown). Perhaps I should (could) ditch the hoover as it's a fire risk?

But here's the rub. We visited the London Fire Brigade Museum on its last day of opening on that site in Southwark. It is moving to the Albert Embankment, opening in three years time. If our experience is anything to go by, I would pencil it in your diary and go visit when it opens. Details on their website here. However, keep an eye out for them, as they told me they will be doing pop-up exhibitions, school visits and events around London while they wait.

Meanwhile Open House London features many museums and will happen again in September 2016. Details on their website here.

We had a great time and so it seems did this kid.