Drawing on a (Grand)Mother’s Experience
Schedule
Sat May 25 2024 at 02:30 pm to 04:30 pm
Location
16 Narrow Quay, BS1 4QA Bristol, United Kingdom | Bristol, EN
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Originally intended as a one-off performance work to make sense of the first eight years of motherhood, Bobby Baker’s Drawing on a Mother’s Experience (1988) gained widespread critical acclaim and went on to be shown multiple times over the next 12 years. Having learned caution as a mother and the ability to think ahead, the performance sites Baker as a meticulously prepared action painter, who has substituted oil paint and canvas for a double bed sheet and various foodstuffs. Poking fun at her male predecessors (artists such as Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning and others) Baker’s revelatory commentary interrogates domesticity, motherhood and the role of the artist, using each ingredient to represent a specific event or episode in her recent personal history. In 2015, the artist revisited the work and devised an updated version:
Drawing on a (Grand) Mother’s Experience (DOGME). This was first performed at WOW – Women of the World Festival at the Southbank Centre in 2015, following an invitation to re-stage Drawing on a Mother’s Experience. By then, a grandmother and as dedicated a feminist as ever, Baker chose to instead bring her original performance up to date.
DOGME explores the experience of early motherhood from the more reflective vantage point of age and experience while considering the ongoing challenge of combining motherhood and parental responsibilities with the drive to retain autonomy.
For this event, marking the closing weekend of Acts of Creation, a film version of DOGME will be screened, followed by a talk by the artist – a very welcome return to Arnolfini by Baker.
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Where is it happening?
16 Narrow Quay, BS1 4QA Bristol, United Kingdom, 16 Narrow Quay, Bristol, BS1 4, United Kingdom,Bristol, United KingdomEvent Location & Nearby Stays:
