Apples From the Bohemia Tree
HELEN MURPHY & NICK PELLING take a look at a dynastic exhibition
The current exhibition at the marvellous Rogue Gallery on Norman Road brings us three separate, quite different artists who are nevertheless tied together by one extraordinary fact: they are mother, daughter and granddaughter. And though we do not really think artiness trickles through our bloodlines, there is something curious going on in this exhibition in that all three women seem to have inherited a Bohemianism of the soul and indeed, of the wardrobe. All three have said, ‘up yours’ to bourgeois bondage and lived their lives with the colour control turned up to eleven.
TEASING TULIPS
The original fountainhead of all this paint-splattered rebellion is Molly Parkin. Molly exploded on to the London fashion scene in the1960s, becoming a fashion editor with a mission to “tease the edges of taste”, as Dennis Hackett put it. But she was so much more: a painter, novelist, controversialist and fab hat maker. She caused a storm of self-righteous indignation in the seventies when her novel Up Tight appeared with a cover showing a French model in see-through knickers. Her paintings in the show revel in colour. Molly’s works enjoy a bit of a mess and she makes the hues dance and rebound off each other. Black Tulips, in particular, has a perfect tension between exotic pattern and splodge.
The work of her daughter, Sophie Parkin, heads off in other directions. Some of it is underpinned by mythological themes such as Persephone Returns and Hoisted by the Ancients, and yet there are whispers of other ideas and appetites at work. Oranges Are the Only Fruit has a muscular sort of force to it. Control edges out mum’s messiness. Sophie’s monoprints are very striking; we particularly liked The Ever Growing Cat Inside My Head. Like her mother, she has somehow invented multiple versions of herself: she is a novelist, poet, painter, journalist and even a social historian. Her book on Bohemian Soho did much to illuminate that lost world.
MAGICAL RETURNS
The youngest of this trio is Carson Parkin-Fairley. Her work revolves around the notion that ‘we are all icons,’ and we all have an inherent tendency to imbue people and objects with meaning that go beyond the mere mundane. She exploits the fact that image-making is also a kind of magic. As one of her intriguing titles puts it, Magical Things Happen Here. Fittingly, the granddaughter uses an image of the young Molly, in her lurid flapper look, as an obvious almost silver-screen icon. In that image there is a strange return to the well-spring. Perhaps.
It is impossible to do justice to the unique vision of each of these powerful women, and yet to grasp that somehow they are bound by some brilliant bohemian thread. In a sense, much of the aesthetic of this show seems connected to Molly Parkin’s original, fabulous advice on dressing, “just fling on any old thing, so long as it’s clashy.”
The Parkin Lot continues until 15 June
We hope you have enjoyed reading this article. The future of our volunteer led, non-profit publication would be far more secure with the aid of a small donation. You can also support local journalism by becoming a friend of HIP. It only takes a minute and we would be very grateful.
Leave a Reply