209 Women (28 February – 14 April) – Open Eye Gallery, Liverpool
- Eli Regan
- Mar 3, 2019
- 3 min read
A woman in a bright red dress with blonde, wind-swept hair is in sharp focus while a dramatic, fuzzy hill backdrop makes her look like a heroine in a Bronte novel. The woman in question is Ruth George, Labour MP for High Peak (image by photographer Kate Stanworth) and part of the project 209 Women currently pulling in audiences for the Open Eye.
Chiefly curated by Hilary Wood along with Open Eye’s Tracy Marshall 209 Women represents the 209 Women Members of Parliament in photographs taken solely by women photographers.
Brexit looms large in the British psyche, a result of the 24 hours news cycle and it’s hard not to feel bleak or some kind of apathy, and yet, a show about politicians manages to be joyful and alluring.
It’s a show that’s timely not only because it coincides with the political turmoil that the UK is experiencing but it channels a global mood of wanting more representation for women in all aspects of life and particularly in the realms of power.
Ruth George’s environmental portrait is particularly striking because she campaigned against the development of green sites for several years. If you saw the portrait without context it would still be visually arresting but George’s campaigning lends it layers of meaning.
As you enter the gallery, the first notable curatorial decision while directly looking at the high walls is all the space that has been left without portraits. Instead, as a viewer, you focus on the pictures you can see at eye-level feeling that these women MPs work together closely given the little breathing space on the walls.
A young woman with a long ponytail and large glasses and hooped earrings grins at the camera. She is Laura Pidcock, MP for North West Durham photographed by Andrea Allan. She famously said she wouldn’t drink at the parliamentary pubs with Tories: “I feel disgusted at the way they’re running the country, it’s visceral – I’m not interested in being cosy.”
With the country ravaged by austerity, it’s difficult to do anything but agree with her.
And yet, in 209 Women, we find a deeply collaborative project.
As attested by Open Eye’s Director of Development & Partnerships Tracy Marshall, the photographers weren’t always on the same page politically as the MPs. Former DWP Secretary of State and MP for Tatton Esther McVey is clad in a grey suit and stands confidently, almost imperiously in a back alley. Her legacy is of intransigence and a shocking lack of empathy: she oversaw a department that wanted rape victims to relive their experiences in order to claim tax credits for a third child (the policy of child tax credit being limited to two children per household.) Interestingly enough, McVey was shot by photojournalist Carol Allen-Storey, who specialises in stories of complicated social issues and poverty.
Other photographers such as Amak Mahmoodian have a more creative approach. Mahmoodian’s portrait of Labour MP for Darlington Jenny Chapman is surreal. Clad in Labour red Chapman sits on a sofa while her assistant who sits next to her holds up a monochrome image of a suffragette.
It’s destabilising in the best way, almost funny. It’s also reminiscent of Soviet collage art and Dadaism.
A more classical approach is taken by Tereza Cervenova who photographs Labour MP for Newcastle Central Chi Onwurah. Onwurah gazes out of a parliament grand window with the light touching her skin and showing its myriad rich tones in a wonderful work of chiaroscuro. Onwurah formed her political identity as a student with the anti-apartheid movement and in the knowledge of the poverty suffered by her maternal grandfather, a Newscastle sheet metal worker during the North East Depression of the thirties.
There is a timeline alongside the exhibition including this entry about 1975:
“The Sex Discrimination Act makes it illegal to discriminate against women in work, education and training.”
Unfortunately, we all know, that although this may be illegal, it’s not what happens in practice.
We still need initiatives such as ‘Pregnant Then Screwed’ by Joeli Brearley who spoke to a Parliamentary committee about the use of non-disclosure agreements in discrimination cases against women.
The cumulative effect of picture after picture of Women MPs does create a deep resonance of power changing hands from male-centric Parliament to one which includes women.
The picture is complex of course. This does not mean that women’s rights are always protected as they should be (Esther McVey, etc).
And yet, the visibility of women in Parliament, historically regarded a place for the patriarchy, can only make reasonable young women and men more dedicated to shifting the balance of power.
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