ABOUT THE PIECE: Text from Audre Lorde's seminal book of poems and essays Your Silence Will Not Protect You. Lorde (1934 - 1992) was a poet, essayist, librarian, feminist and equal rights activist.
Each one of Rachael House's plates arrives with a clever hanging device to safely showcase on a wall if required, watch the video HERE to see how they work.
RACHAEL HOUSE - GIRLS TO THE FRONT
It's a powerful thing, to be able to protest through your art, and British artist Rachael House has been doing this for decades. The importance of her work has been recognised by many institutions including the Whitechapel Art Gallery, The Wellcome Trust and the V&A Museum, who acquired a tiled panel for the Museum's incredibly prestigious permanent collection.
For this exclusive collection made for The Shop Floor Project, Rachael has created a collection of large hand made platters. Decorated in her signature fish-scale and cross-hatched patterns with words written in a 14th century style font.
The texts are quotes gathered from a mixture of sources over her career. From the Feminist Library (where she was artist-in-residence) to bands such as Bikini Kill, writers including Angela Carter and Maya Angelou, political activists and queer writers.
These plates, which are part protest, part joyful celebration, are a call to action by the artist. Her energetic and repetitive patterns almost become a stormy sea full of waves that have a sense of energy and urgency.
Each large plate is hand moulded by Rachael in her studio, where she adds details such as pie-crust edging and stamping each one with her charming maker's stamp - an R set within a house.
Rachael House's work focuses on feminist and queer politics and resistant histories. She uses humour as a tool for discussion and engagement.
An important part of Rachael House's fine art practice is the making of zines. Beginning in the 1960's, zines were cheaply produced booklets used to promote social and political activism. In the 1990s Rachael was part of the international queerzine scene and today her zines are recognised in museum and university archives and feature in academic art books. It is from this work that her text and decorative style, that she now explores through ceramics, was originally born.
Rachael House's work has been commissioned by many institutions worldwide, including: The Pittsburgh Center for The Arts, Grundy Art Gallery, The V&A Museum and the De La Warr Pavilion. We are very proud to be able to show this special collection of one-off plates by one of Britain's most exciting artists.
