‘The Five Points’, N. Y. 1880
‘Gin Alley’, London 1780

Place names consigned to history; but life for some, was then, as it is now.

This collection has been conceived to infect the viewer’s senses, by focusing on the lives of those girls whose options were limited to selling themselves for others pleasure. ‘A Return to Victorian Values?’ could easily have been the title of this series of works, had there been a time when society had been rid of this malaise.

Drawing upon sourced historical references (factual and literary), including ‘Harris’ List of Covent Garden Ladies’, this work explores the seamy underbelly of society and shows how little life in the city, has not changed for some over the centuries.

Citing New York and London as backdrops - we see work, although historical in its basis, is both uncomfortably familiar and tragically topical in its tale.

Polluted stagnant air seeps into every street and room and smile and pore. Greasy hands are shaken with corpse clammy insincerity and one-sided deals are agreed. The putrefying city is an unappetising stew - made up of the stench of bins in back alleys and the thoughts which lurk behind the portrait smiles of the suited-Joes on front streets.

Although ‘times’ have changed, the darkest recesses of the mind remain largely un-evolved. Those desires fed by repulsive greed and sexual depravity have always been there. It is possible in those times; they had more ready release, because the resulting acts were almost impossible to attribute to the guilty perpetrator. 

Prostitution and sexual slavery has existed in some form for as long as man has documented his own existence, and in the days of the 1880s as today, this will result in many missing persons and many more ‘Jane Does’.

The timeline of mans' outward achievements may be accelerating, but that of his dark subconscious is as determinedly and contentedly sluggish as it ever was.

Artist's note:
The box frames in this collection were carefully designed and handmade. They are a facsimile of display cases in the Victorian Era. Wealthy folk in those times travelled the world or went on the Grand Tour. On their return they would proudly show off their haul of artefacts and souvenirs. Entymology and botanical finds played a large part. These species could be displayed in glass cabinets or framed boxes in drawers. The frames in this case are there to enforce the idea that I see these girls as precious specimens - to be handled gently and with care. They are fragile and faded as so many butterfly wings.

They are there to be admired and marvelled at - in contrast to their actual lives and treatment they received at the hands of their captors. The collage panels are reminders of the bawdy house wallpapers and intentionally botanical chosen patterns. The background colour of sterile blue is there as a juxtaposition to the unsavoury conditions they found themselves in.