Comrade Corbyn's Allotment, 2018

Another excuse to satirise Labour Party politics of 2015-20 and its leader, Jeremy Corbyn, in particular. It seems unbelievable and horrifying now that he could have held that position for so long.  The background to this pot is the attempted murder in 2018 of former military officer Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury - presumably on Putin's orders - using the nerve agent, Novichok. There was a repeat use of this chemical weapon that killed two UK citizens. Corbyn refused to condemn Russia for an attack that might have resulted in the mass poisoning of much of the population of a British city. 

Comrade Corbyn's Allotment, (based on Mary Mary Quite Contrary): 

Comrade Corbyn

Puppet of Putin

How’s your allotment grow?

With Novichok

PIE

Antisemites and a

Spy

Poisoning pretty maids

And then

Lying

Low.

Corbyn leans on his spade, a basket of beetroot at his feet. There's a story in that but it is a minor detail for this pot, anyway. Shami Shakrabati waters the allotment as Niobe, 'all tears,' as she fondly strokes an Ermine and John Mcdonnell is wheeling away the skull harvest in his barrow. 

Death calls by and does a final sweep. 

The Ballad of Sister Bergdorf, 2018

A Pilgrim vase - about 30 x 30 cm approx

Some Background 

The Ballad of Sister Bergdorf grew out my observation that an unholy coupling had occurred between religion and politics. 'Art discourse' was one of its most obnoxious offspring. I have discussed 'cultural appropriation,' since the 1980s, theorised 'appropriately,' particularly on ceramics, since the 1990s, debated with feminists on transgender politics, among other things, since the late 1990s, and argued with transactivists since the early 2000s. I've held forth on social media - mostly on Facebook -  about all of it since 2010. I have even been described as a 'veteran of the culture wars,' by the writer Jo Bartosch so, if that doesn't convince you that I am familiar with this territory, nothing will. It took some time to find my satirical voice - or at least to find a way to express it on pots - but the jugs that I started making in 2015 gave vent to the first collection of work that deals directly with the increasing madness of politics. Looking back now, I can see the satire clearly enough in Nightwalker, (2014,) and there are probably hints before that. 

About the politics

When politics walked through the looking glass and the Labour Party appointed Munroe Bergdorf, a transwoman, as their advisor on 'LGBT' issues, it was time to respond. Bergdorf isn't gay. Transgender isn't gay - it isn't about who you love, it's about how you see yourself. Bergdorf has had vast amounts of radical and cosmetic surgery to make her body resemble an idealised, porn-woman. 'She' lives as she imagines a woman might, but she is not female - or as we used to say, 'a woman.' Her sex is male, consistent with being what we used to call 'a man.' Nonetheless she - yes I do use that term for her because I've grown used to it and do not wish to have my pronouns policed by purists any more than I do by transactivists - she opines on feminism, shamelessly lecturing women on how to do feminism better, and is now lecturing anyone who will listen on the matter of menstrual periods. This is someone who grew up a boy and has never had a period in her life. This is where we find ourselves: MtF transexual women claiming to have experiential knowledge of menstruation simply because they call themselves women and choose to ignore the fact they are biologically male. Their notion of sex (the noun not the verb,) is that it is based on faith - like religion - not on biological material reality. Put simply, Transactivists and their institutions, Stonewall and many others, have conflated sex and gender and sought to impose their beliefs on the entire population. Volumes of analysis has been written on this, so I will not add more. The redoubtable Allison Bailey, from LGB Alliance, covers most of the main points in her statement which was redacted from her crowdjustice page - as if to prove the very point the statement makes - but reproduced with permission by A Woman's Place UK.  A good ten volumes would now be required to cover all the issues adequately, and this is just a blog post, but it should make my own position clear. This piece I wrote for 'Howie's Corner,' for International Women's Day, may clarify some further issues if needed. 

About the pot

The Ballad of Sister Bergdorf is only the beginning. There will have to be more because the madness has spun right out of control but, at the time I made this, I was still finding a way to convert words like these into pots. I chose a pilgrim flask form because it has religious connotations. I also like the simple binary of the shape it has front and a back, or it can do, and it has its ceramic roots in Renaissance Maiolica which featured religious imagery, mythology and, on occasion, political satire.

I also set myself the challenge of using buzz words from academia and art-talk just for hell of it. Look out for the following: 

misgender - as in 'you misgendered me.' This means speaking to or about a transperson using the wrong pronoun - an offence for which women have lost their jobs and their livelihoods and for which some have been investigated by police. 

Othering -  a process of creating difference and distance between groups of people. I like this term and find it one the more useful ideas couched in language that academia has provided in the last thirty years or so. 

Cultural Appropriation - the assertion that a cultural artefact, performance, or custom belongs to a specific culture and is appropriated by another - often with a socio-political or geopolitical dimension that disadvantages the 'owner' or presumed originator of the culture. It is characterised by exponents as theft from a subjugated culture or people by a dominant or more powerful culture or nation. This one is a political and cultural minefield and is fundamentally dependent on Nationalist politics to operate. As such, it is inherently flawed since has become part of the most treasured political tools of people who regard themselves as anti-Imperialist. While anti-Imperialism and Nationalism certainly do go together, Nationalism cannot work with anti-racism and proponents of the ideology of cultural appropriation, for the most part, think of themselves as vehemently anti-racist - and often are, passionately so. Hence the minefield. 

Here is the text in full as it is written on the pot pictured above. 

The Ballad of Sister Bergdorf

Her novitiate completed,

Miss Gender Ring-Munroe

Bade farewell to the Convent sisters

Of St. Simpering-le-Beau

To the land of Eternal Doublethink

Our pious pilgrim was bound

Where Our Lady of Perpetual Othering’s

Shrine, in the woods, by a river, was found.

She hadn’t been long on the road

Only a mile from Doublethink Station

When Lo! She beheld the Sepulchre

Of Cultural Appropriation.

The stone had been rolled away

And there appeared Our Lady of Other,

Miss Gender was struck

By the light – What the Fuck!

I’m not a nun,

I’m a monk!

I’m a Brother!

'February, Dark and Cold,' 2019, a pot from 'And The Door Opened,'

'February Dark and Cold,' 2019, 63 h x 28 w cm 

Hand built earthenware pot, slip-painted inside and out with sgraffito drawing through the slip. Bisque fired. Smashed by dropping it into a box on the floor. The box helps to contain the flying shards but it also breaks the fall to some extent so the shattering isn't so dramatic. Some of the larger pieces were dropped again to encourage them to break a bit more. The shards were then collected up and glazed, then fired, and the pieces reassembled with some left out so the viewer can glimpse the images inside. Broken edges gilded in gold leaf.

About the pot
This is the account of a young woman, a fifteen year old girl at the start of her story, whose mother had a job that frequently took her abroad. She seems to have had no other parent or guardian so was left alone. The account is sparse. At some point she has a son, has a drink and drug problem, and also mental health difficulties. When W@W first meet her, she is being sold for sex on the London streets. They help her to 'return to her northern town,' to her family. She leaves again. It appears there is sexual abuse and/or exploitation but it is not spelled out. She returns to London and is street homeless - and immensely vulnerable to (further?) exploitation in prostitution. She describes the cold dark damp of February and the violence on the London streets. At some point she is arrested and is in prison for a while. Once out of prison she contacts W@W again and gets support with the drugs and alcohol problems. They also help her to find a housing solution. This very young woman with a history of abuse going back to her early teenage years now has an interlocking mix of problems which, together, make housing and a future life immensely difficult. The pot has a number of gaps and cracks. This young woman's process of mending her life is only midway, probably. She still has a long way to go. She misses her child. It is unclear where her mother and the rest of her family is. What is clear is that she knows W@W are there to provide support when she needs it.

Photo credit: Sylvain Deleu.

Women @the Well, (W@W,) is a women-only service located in Kings Cross dedicated to supporting women whose lives are affected, or at risk of being affected, by prostitution. It also provides support to exit prostitution. 

‘And The Door Opened,’ is a series of events with displays of Claudia’s pots, with talks and demonstrations that illustrate the lives of the women supported by W@W.

The aim is to enhance the public’s understanding of what prostitution is, to name the abuse and exploitation, and to show that, with the right support, girls and women do not need to live and die exploited in the sex trade – there are ways out.

'Street Exit,' 2019, A Pot from And The Door Opened

 

 

'Street Exit,' 2019, 60 h x 28 w cm 

Hand built earthenware pot, slip-painted inside and out with sgraffito drawing through the slip. The bisque fired pot was then smashed with a hammer - an uncomfortable process - avoiding hitting any of the women, just going for the bits in between. Shards collected up and glazed, then fired, and the pieces reassembled with some left out so the viewer can glimpse the images inside. Broken edges gilded in gold leaf.

About the pot
'Street Exit,' is based on an account given to me by Women @the Well. The images inside the pot show the living places of a homeless woman who met W@W outreach workers in Hackney. She describes 'sofa surfing' with friends who were 'heavy substance users.' She wanted to get away from them so she moved to a tent in a 'green area in Hackney.' She was being exploited in prostitution in both these situations.W@W helped find a place in a hostel and set in motion a support system to help her to reduce and eventually cease her substance use and also to find a way to exit prostitution with the ultimate aim of finding safe, permanent accommodation. The latter is a longer term and probably more difficult goal to achieve given the extreme shortage of safe housing for women in London - particularly those with such complex range of vulnerabilities.

The outside of the pot shows the progress of a woman from street to hostel based on details from the above account and some others along with my own encounters with street homeless women on public transport. Homeless women often avoid hostels because they are heavily male dominated and pose a real threat of sexual violence from the men there. They also avoid the street, if they can, for the same reasons - and also because of the cold, the wet and the sheer exhaustion of never really sleeping -  so public transport, being both public, rather than hidden, and a bit warmer and dryer is potentially a better option. The images above show a woman begging in the underground both at the station and on a train, sleeping - or trying to - in the station and on a bus and, finally, in a hostel sitting at table with a cup of tea contemplating the long and difficult process ahead. Like many of the accounts W@W have asked me to work with, this woman's life is very 'in process.' She has not yet reached a safe conclusion.

'Street Exit,' like 'Women @the Well,' the pot posted earlier, is a broken and mended pot. The images inside are visible through the gaps but only just. You do need to see the pot, 'in person,' to be able to see them. The shattering of the pot is a metaphor the broken feelings the woman expresses and her process of slowly piecing her life back together. It is an imperfect process. She is unlikely to reach a state of complete 'restoration,' but she can continue to live and may be able to thrive, in time. Memories and images of her past will impinge on her present from time to time, however. She may well not live in the past but the past, to some extent, will probably live in her, in her 'emotional muscle memory,' if I may put it that way, and it may be expressed through her emotional responses to things and to situations. I frame the fissures and and gaps in gold leaf to honour her survival and her struggle to proceed through life.

Photo credit: Sylvain Deleu.

Women @the Well, (W@W,) is a women-only service located in Kings Cross dedicated to supporting women whose lives are affected, or at risk of being affected, by prostitution. It also provides support to exit prostitution. 

‘And The Door Opened,’ is a series of events with displays of Claudia’s pots, with talks and demonstrations that illustrate the lives of the women supported by W@W.

The aim is to enhance the public’s understanding of what prostitution is, to name the abuse and exploitation, and to show that, with the right support, girls and women do not need to live and die exploited in the sex trade – there are ways out.

And The Door Opened: the shop window display - November 2nd 2019-January 6th 2020

The photos below all show the shop window display that was set up on November 2nd and changed bit by bit throughout the display period as I was able to add complete pots. The titles were added last with quotes from some of the people who attended the launch and demonstration. Professional photos of the individual pots will be added with more about each one, including some of the accounts on which the pot is based.

Women @the Well, (W@W,) is a women-only service located in Kings Cross dedicated to supporting women whose lives are affected, or at risk of being affected by prostitution, and helps them to find ways out.

‘And The Door Opened,’ is a series of events with displays of Claudia’s pots, with talks and demonstrations that illustrate the lives of the women supported by W@W.

The aim is to enhance the public’s understanding of what prostitution is, to name the abuse and exploitation, and to show that, with the right support, girls and women do not need to live and die exploited in the sex trade – there are ways out.

And The Door Opened: the Launch, November 25th, 2019

'And the Door Opened' launched, (officiall,) on November 25th, to coincide with the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women.

Held in the old Post Office in Wood Green, now occupied by Collage-arts and renamed Collage Artspace 4, we had a full house - 53 people came not including speakers or photographer.

Me speaking, introducing the project and welcoming the audience. Speakers on the left, from left: Caroline Hattersley, director of Women @the Well; Fiona Broadfoot, sex trade survivor, founder of Build a Girl, and one of three survivors bringing the judicial review, with the Centre for Women's Justice, to get criminal convictions removed from the record exited women; Julie Bindel, journalist, researcher and campaigner and author of The Pimping of Prostitution,' 2017, Palgrave Macmillan; and next to Julie Bindel is Julie McNamara who compered and led us into the minute's silence before I smashed the pot in the centre of the room. She also ended the event reading Audre Lourde's 'Litany for Survival.' McNamara is a performer, writers, activist and Artist direct of Vital Exposure, 'a passionate plea for social justice.'  Below is a montage of three views of pot then called 'Ten Thousand Men,' that was smashed. It will be renamed once it is rebuilt and images of the women painted inside become dominant.

The images of me smashing the pot and the two below them are by Sylvain Deleu, as is the one directly above, showing a detail of the inside of the pot smashed at the Filia Conference in Bradford. This pot is now called, 'I'm Not The Criminal,' and the image is of Fiona Broadfoot who led the March Against the Sex Trade in Bradford where the pot was smashed. The other images show the pots on display at the event, some complete, some in progress. All photos by attendees - except the one with Fiona Broadfoot talking to journalist, Josephine Bartosch - that one is also by Sylvian Deleu.

Women @the Well, (W@W,) is a women-only service located in Kings Cross dedicated to supporting women whose lives are affected, or at risk of being affected by prostitution, and helps them to find ways out.

‘And The Door Opened,’ is a series of events with displays of Claudia’s pots, with talks and demonstrations that illustrate the lives of the women supported by W@W.

The aim is to enhance the public’s understanding of what prostitution is, to name the abuse and exploitation, and to show that, with the right support, girls and women do not need to live and die exploited in the sex trade – there are ways out.

March Against the Sex Trade, Filia Conference 2019, Bradford.

The March Against the Sex Trade took place on the Saturday evening, October 19^th, at the end of day one of Filia conference. We assembled at twilight and processed to Centenary Square, the main square in Bradford. There we gathered in a circle and, after an introduction by Fiona Broadfoot, read out the names of all the women who had been murdered while exploited in prostitution. Shocking how long it took. As daylight was faded, and the sky went deep blue, we held up white roses and cards, each with the name of one murdered woman, and called out the names again, all together this time, like a Greek Chorus. Once all the names had been sounded at least three times, we had a minute’s silence to reflect on the harms of prostitution and sex trade, and to remember the lives and deaths of the women whose names were called. ‘The Invisible Man,’ the pot set up in the centre of the circle, ‘broke the silence,’ as it smashed on to the paved stone ground, releasing the images of women painted inside.

The memorial concluded with a song and a dance by an Argentinian woman, one of the conference speakers, whose daughter had been abducted, prostituted, and murdered in Buenos Aires.

Perhaps the most significant part though was this: I was about to collect and wrap up the shards when a young man who was passing by with his girlfriend, asked me if I knew Rebecca Hall, one of the women whose names were called out during the memorial. ‘I knew her,’ he said, ‘She was one of my best friends at school. This means so much to me.’ He then went and spoke to the woman holding the card with Rebecca’s name on it. You can read about Rebecca here.

The shards are now on their way back to the studio where they will be glazed and the pot reassembled but with pieces left out so you can see the images of the women painted inside. If all goes according to plan, the internal images – the women - will dominate. You will see them rather than the men depicted on the outside of the pot. The shattering and mending of a pot is a simple metaphor, reflected in the words, ‘I was shattered. Now I’m piecing myself slowly back together.’

Among my proudest moments, as a feminist and a potter, are when my pots are part of feminist activism, especially activism against the sex trade and the call for abolition. The March Against the Sex Trade was an action done as part of a feminist conference but in a public space. Reaching out to survivors, to family and friends of survivors, and to passers by  - the public in the most general sense, is surely the most important of any campaign. It was a huge honour to be part of it.

The names of the women murdered in prostitution in Bradford

May 21 2010, Suzanne Blamires, 36

April 26 2010 Shelley Armitage, 31

June 22 2009, Susan Rushworth, 43

April 26 2001: Rebecca Hall, 19

May 2000 Gemma Simpson, 23

October 1996: Caroline Creevy, 25

June 8 1995: Maureen Stepan, 18

1992 Yvonne Fitt, 32

1984: Deborah Kershaw,22

January 21 1978: Yvonne Pearson, 21

Wiki page – women UK-wide  - This is UK and Ireland - from 2010-today. 

Fiona Broadfoot is one of the women bringing the judicial review aiming to get convictions removed from the record of exited women and remove the need for disclosure which represents a major barrier for prostituted women who are trying to exit.

Photos from top: 1- Studio Twelve, 2 and 3 - Deb Ball, 3,4 and 5 - Claudia Clare