ReFrame

About

Artists Caroline Broadhead and Maisie Broadhead are mother and daughter but work independently of each other. This is the second time that they have collaborated. The exhibition presents new works in response to historic paintings of women by famous male artists who are represented in Manchester Art Gallery’s collections, including Lord Frederic Leighton and John William Waterhouse.

The artists interrogate how the pictorial conventions of historic paintings and their elaborate frames affect our perceptions of the women depicted.  By blurring, transgressing and stretching the frames and edges of images, the artists disrupt the relationship between the picture and its surrounding. These interventions raise questions about how the women have been represented and create dialogues between the past and the present.

Caroline Broadhead has exhibited extensively worldwide over four decades. Her practice encompasses jewellery, textiles, contemporary dance, and sculpture. In this exhibition she uses beadwork and found objects to make enigmatic three-dimensional objects which investigate physical and psychological aspects of the paintings.

Maisie Broadhead works principally with digital photography. She established her studio in 2009 and was awarded the Jerwood Makers Open prize in 2012. She makes images which reference historic paintings and their frames in order to reflect on human situations that draw parallels between the past and present.