18/05/21
Challenging Convention
Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle
17 May – 21 August 2021
Women never had a chance to excel in the old days; they were not allowed the education … At last they are having their chance. [Laura Knight, 1930]
This quote by Laura Knight captures well the mood and motivation of the curators of this summer’s long-delayed (due to Covid) exhibition at the Laing Art Gallery in Newcastle, Challenging Convention. The gallery’s all-female creative team, passionate about researching and highlighting female artists in the collection, took, as its starting point, the works by Dod Procter (1890-1972) and Laura Knight (1877-1970) belonging to the gallery, and added two further artists, Vanessa Bell (1879-1961) and Gwen John (1876-1939), who although coming from very different social backgrounds, were born within 15 years of one another.
Read the full review here