Grayson’s Art Club: A Healing Exhibition for Britain
Amongst the turbulence and emotional strain of the pandemic, Grayson’s Art Club on Channel 4 was a comforting reminder that we are not alone. Allowing members of the British public to submit original artworks responding to the coronavirus outbreak, Grayson Perry brought the nation together through the power of creative release. Now, in the “post-covid” world, Bristol Museum and Art Gallery invites us to celebrate the artworks produced on the programme in a moving and exciting exhibition, honouring the experiences of the British public.
The show is unlike any other held in Bristol Museum, with its public focus and devotion to the everyday experience of lockdown in 2020. Never before has an exhibition of such power spoken so acutely to shared experience and Britishness to sum up the emotions of the nation. As viewers, we effortlessly connect to and understand the artworks, with the visceral memory of lockdown still fresh in our minds.
In tune with Grayson’s playful character, the immersive exhibition trail weaves its way through the various exhibits of Bristol Museum, placing both public and professional artworks amongst reconstructions of dinosaur skeletons, historical Bristolian ceramics, and the Gallery’s own collections of paintings and artifacts. The trail cleverly leads us through thematic explorations of lockdown in Britain, including ‘Work’, ‘Dreams’ and ‘Family’, in which amateur and even first-time art is held in the same regard as pieces from professional artists including Lucy Sparrow, Frank Bowling and Grayson Perry himself.
The exhibition also contains artworks from some of our favourite figures within the British media – including Harry Hill, Tom Allen and Sue Perkins – who provided us with a much -needed comic escape from the monotony of lockdown. Yet, the power lies in the work from members of the public and their documentation of the struggle of living through a lockdown in Britain: a struggle we can all-too-easily relate to. The show is an unprecedented linkage of art with the general public and daily experience. To have publicly produced artwork displayed in such a momentous institution is refreshing and joyous.
With help from the Museum’s curatorial team, the artworks have been carefully placed in dialogue with the museum’s current exhibits, including Sue Perkins’ crocheted burger in contrast with ornate Chinese crockery, and, most profoundly, Perry’s tiger sculpture positioned against the skeletal remains of a dinosaur, drawing our attention to the danger of this species falling to extinction. Such poignant placements invite us to consider our experiences and impact on the world around us, cleverly coaxing us to interrogate our existence within the pandemic.
One of the most striking paintings in the ‘Work’ section of the exhibition was Work, During Lockdown, an acrylic painting by Enda O’Gorman. Painted with a graphic flatness and geometry, the painting displays the familiar scene of the British high street under the restrictions of full lockdown. We see businesses shuttered up, recreational spaces closed, and pavements abandoned: it is desolate, isolated and bleak.
The ghostly emptiness of the streets strongly resonates with feelings of loneliness and loss during the pandemic, an experience effecting all Brits alike. Celebrating the efforts of key workers, whilst also suggesting the darker side of the pandemic, O’Gorman places an ambulance in the foreground, reminding us of the losses coronavirus has caused.
The artwork praises key workers of all kinds: we see a Deliveroo rider in the background of the composition, following a sparsely populated bus, suggestive of those who sacrificed their health in order to keep our country running. This theme of heroism stretches through the entire exhibition. Indeed, the exhibition’s devotion to art from the general public proves to honour the ordinary Brit for their valiant plight against the dreaded coronavirus.
The exhibition is perhaps among the most inclusive in the Museum’s history, featuring work from all corners of British society. Becky Tyler’s portrait of Grayson himself was remarkably completed using only her eyes through tracking software, as her disabilities inhibit her from using her hands. The exhibition uses public memory of isolation to understand Tyler’s everyday struggles. [1] The exhibition invites us to consider: Tyler’s disabilities, the impact of the pandemic on foodbanks, the difficulties of working through Zoom, lockdown’s strains on the family dynamic and explorations of identity. The exhibition’s inclusive stance gives a sense of hope for the future of exhibitions.
Even students have been represented in Zoë Pyne’s Unlikely Family, an acrylic painting celebrating the experience of student living under lockdown. Echoing the national bonding effect of “Grayson’s Art Club”, the painting uses colour to represent the merging of cultures and experiences that has occurred in the shared experience of lockdown, furthered by the vibrant experience of university housing. We have all had to adapt these past few years, and Grayson’s exhibition epitomises this.
Witty, moving and validating, the Grayson’s Art Club exhibition is not to be missed. Tickets are available until the 4th of September 2022 via the Bristol Museum and Art Gallery website: https://www.bristolmuseums.org.uk/bristol-museum-and-art-gallery/whats-on/grayson-perry-art-club/
By Tom Dance - Art History Pathway, Commissioning Editor
Photography by Tom Dance
[1] Grayson’s Art Club: An Exhibition for Britian, Channel 4, 10 December 2021, online video recording, All 4, <https://www.channel4.com/programmes/graysons-art-club > [accessed 7 January 2022].