Dorich House Museum

CREATIVE PROCESSES | DORA GORDINE AND NADIA HEBSON

Whilst we are temporarily closed to the public, we are working with our partner venue Stanley Picker Gallery to compile a weekly newsletter highlighting previous projects, collection items and activity suggestions to keep you inspired and creative at home. The theme for today’s newsletter, Thursday 30 April is creative processes.

Designed and built as a studio home, and conceived as a giant piece of sculpture, Dorich House was a place of artistic production for Gordine’s sculpture, painting and drawing. The process of sketching, modelling in clay and building up the plaster form with a technique she called “a la Boulette”  (Figure Quarterly, April 1956) were carried out in Gordines’ two working studios, a ground floor plaster studio and a first floor modelling studio, connected by a manual hoist. Gordine was closely involved in the casting of her sculpture in bronze which took place at the Valsuani foundry in Paris until 1939 and subsequently at the Morris Singer Foundry in Fulham. We continue the legacy of artistic production at Dorich House through our studio residencies to support women’s creative practice, which is generously supported through a private donation.

Having successfully piloted the scheme with invited artists Cathie Pilkington in 2018 and Hen Coleman in 2019, Stockholm-based artist Nadia Hebson was selected for the 2020 Studio Residency through a public open call that received nearly 400 applications. Working obliquely with the legacy of women artists, through her practice Hebson has sought to comprehend the relationship between painting, biography, persona and clothing, through a consideration of the work Winifred Knights 1899-1947 and Christina Ramberg 1946-95. Hebson’s practice spans the mediums of painting, sculpture and relief and text which can be subjective, poetic, or academic in tone. Alongside this, Hebson also works collaboratively to realise talks and programmes.

In the coming months, Hebson will produce a contribution to Dora: Dialogues on Women’s Creative Practice and Thinking and lead a series of reading groups, The [Virtual] Reading Circle, in the spirit of the salons sculptor Dora Gordine and her husband the Hon. Richard Hare reputedly hosted in their former studio home. This series of reading groups is an opportunity to read selected texts in company (virtually), with the proposal that we consider the emergence of the subjective female voice in relation to writing, visual art and the ever expanding field of artistic recuperation. Working together to share our understanding and responses to the writing selected, you are always welcome to join even if you haven’t read the texts.

The [Virtual] Reading Circle is happening at 1pm on Friday 1st,  15th and 29th May – the events are free and all are welcome, however places are limited. Please RSVP to receive joining instructions.

Today, Dorich House Museum is participating in BBC Arts’ Culture in Quarantine #MuseumFromHome – follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter as we highlight some of the content we’ve been developing during lockdown, alongside the UK’s museums, galleries and archives. The museum team, including many of our volunteers and collaborators, have fortunately been able to work from home during this period to progress our projects and programmes. 

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