Handpicked at Kettle's Yard, Cambridge
If I may butcher a Miranda Priestly quote from The Devil Wears Prada: "an exhibition about flowers in spring? Groundbreaking". Yet, this exhibition at Kettle's Yard in Cambridge allows unexpected ideas to blossom. Despite the loyal museum aesthetic adopted by its curation, the coming together of historical and contemporary artworks allows for a narrative that defies the cliche of being a pretty exhibition about pretty flowers.
There is a cosiness between the subjectivity of experiencing flowers and that of experiencing art. Personally, I had previously not given much thought into the ways in which we might all feel differently about flowers. Of course, many events that punctuate the human experience are marked with flowers: birthdays, anniversaries, weddings, and funerals. Western societies have co-opted flowers to bear a symbolism that they do not necessarily have in the botanical world, and medicinal properties are often overlooked in favour of their aesthetics. A home, and indeed a life surrounded by flora is no bad thing, but the constant that appears in this group show is the temporality of flowers, and their certain way of ensuring that the aforementioned landmark events in our respective lives are reliably fleeting. Nature renews herself, always.
'Handpicked' is divided between a room of historical works, from 1900 to around 1975, and a second space focused on contemporary responses, including some newly commissioned paintings for this exhibition. As someone trained in contemporary art theory with a particular love for it, of course the latter room excited me more, but it is interesting to see something of a chronological timeline of the sorts of flowers that have been memorialised in paintings since the start of the twentieth century, and why artists chose to do so. One example is Flowers by David Bomberg. Painted in 1943, the dynamic use of paint and an almost burning colour palette makes it feel urgent, fresh, and certainly contemporary. It takes a moment to tune one's eyes into deciphering the subject matter as flowers, as the bright burst of red climbs the canvas as if attached to the background. This is where the museum's curatorial insight provides the clarity required to set this apart from the "pretty" exhibition I light-heartedly said it could have been: Bomberg had been commissioned as a war artist in 1942, but after this he was struggling to find employment, so his wife brought him home flowers to paint. For Bomberg, flowers were merely incidental to what was happening in his life and in the wider world at this time, but his work acts as an indication of his inner world and psyche.
Meanwhile in the contemporary section, while there is not a huge leap in curation style, the psychological and social motivations to paint flowers will be more compelling for many viewers. For New York-based painter Jennifer Packer, there is a huge amount of emotion and movement in her Chrysanthemums work from 2015, including visible finger prints. Since George Floyd's murder in 2020 and the global resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement, Packer now dedicates her flower paintings to the victims of police brutality. The artist's flowers are not hyperreal; they are charged with rage, fire, but also a defiant beauty. Fragility and temporary states are recurring, if not unavoidable, aspects of 'Handpicked', but each artist's respective method of confronting these realities is the thread that keeps the viewer interested to learn more.
Jai Chuhan's Flowers II hangs nearby, and like Packer's painting, brings unflinching movement to a subject matter that is notoriously still and seemingly passive. Painted in one sitting, Chuhan's now-distinctive style is once again set ablaze on the canvas, a frenetic scene that is not fully distinguishable, but feels incredibly human. Another artist whose work I have admired for a long time is Kaye Donachie, so I was really pleased to see that a new painting had been commissioned especially for the show at Kettle's Yard. Donachie's work is, again, incredibly distinctive, but light in its perception. A gentle sadness is pervasive in the work, perhaps due to the women she depicts bearing a close resemblance to figures of the past, such as old Hollywood stars and women from the Bible. They are no longer here. There is always a sense that there is a degree of remove between the viewer and the subject; unlike the world we currently live in, we have no right to invade the personal or psychological space of Donachie's women. We can only observe them from a fixed angle, in the state they wish to be seen. The flowers that lie across the neck of the woman featured in this painting, titled Monument to Every Moment, feel entirely decorative. There is a sense of the memorial, but also of the lavishly beautiful.
Whereas the general intention from the paintings in Kettle's Yard's first room was for the flowers to appear as genuinely beautiful, almost as memento mori, the contemporary works provide a range of thought and lived experience that would, for various reasons, not be possible in a show that neglected our current epoch. London-based artist Bianca Raffaella's piece, Waxflower, is another standout. Whereas artists such as Chuhan and Packer adopt bright, flaming palettes, Raffaella's style bodes well against the white walls of the gallery, boasting texture and a sense of something more than merely visual impact that is difficult to define. The artist is partially sighted, and embraces memory and intimacy with her environment in order to translate these feelings and experiences to canvas. With this context, the works inhabit a new meaning and power; gaining an understanding of the artist's approach allows the work to come alive. A greyish-beige background colour on the canvas allows the viewer access to the artist's multisensory memory of holding the flower she is depicting, as opposed to a merely visual perspective. Raffaella's work is an essential part of 'Handpicked'.
Another integral part of the show is the contribution of Kettle's Yard's community panel, whose artworks and insights play a significant part in introducing the show. A video plays at the start of the exhibition, whereby several members of the group discuss the show broadly and highlight particular works of interest. The show's expansion from historically pertinent pieces from the last century into contemporary works is a necessary curatorial move, but adding in artistic responses from the community panel is too, if not moreso. Flowers are a universally perceived and understood theme, and while the researched context enriches the show, so do the insights of local Cambridge residents who might not otherwise feel represented. It will be interesting to see how this group is incorporated into projects hereafter at Kettle's Yard; hopefully their work will sit alongside the curated artists in the main spaces in the not too distant future.
