Processes and practices

The Post War Dream

Processes and practices

The Post War Dream focuses on the concept of new interpretations of ‘modernism’ that emerged after the second world war, a pivotal time that was caught in a conflict between the trauma from the war and transitions in culture and media. These new ideas, hopes and dreams subconsciously manifested themselves in the domestic environment and private lives.

Memories and influences that have been passed on to me by my parents from the post war era has shaped my life in certain ways. I attempt to depict some of these events and experiences with a series of assemblages/relief artworks that reflect the influences of the past.

There are three pieces of work under the one title above, to represent three periods of my life in the post world war 2 era.

1. The Post-War Dream – 1960s/70s

2. The Death (demise) of the Post-War dream.- 1979-84

3. Eulogy to the Post-War dream. – present day

The Pink Panther cartoon Character (TV series 1968-1980) runs as a theme, a common thread through all three pieces of artwork.

Additional pieces shown in this portfolio

-The post war dream cake

-Wallpaper collage

-Image for sound piece

no.1 The post war Dream 1960/70s

No. 1 The Post War Dream -  2022 mixed media, Card, paper, fabric, glass, aluminium and metal.

We’ll meet again
Don’t know where
Don’t know when
But I know we’ll meet again some sunny day

Ross Parker and Hughie Charles. 1939.

sung by Vera Lynn

Does anybody here remember Vera Lynn?
Remember how she said that
We would meet again
Some sunny day?

Roger Waters 1979.

sung by Roger Waters of Pink Floyd

The first piece of work is titled The Post War Dream. This is a recreation of the thoughts and feelings of early childhood. Representative of the late 1960s and early 1970s, the piece attempts to show visual memories by looking through a sheet of glass into the past and seeing a ‘distortion’ of scale (which we experience as young children). The distortions of the domestic environment are subconsciously created by the cultural and political influences. These distortions are shown by a series of imaginary model rooms, people and props at varying scales. My inspiration for this piece came from a small house model I made as a young child and have kept.

A section of reeded glass has been placed over some Christmas lights in one of the ‘rooms’. This is a specific childhood memory of seeing Christmas lights through the glass of lounge doors. All looked very ‘rosy’, pink as the Pink Panther, as though we were looking through rose tinted glasses.

A wall paper collage was created, copied and used as collage to line to the imaginary rooms. Domestic model furniture populates some rooms and family members of different scales occupy the rooms. They are pink as they are the Pink Panthers of that time. Some collage is made of wood chip paper, textiles and papers from the 1970s. A political element is introduced in a ‘room’, as the domestic life styles of the time are influenced by consumer aspirations and political agendas.

The words to Vera Lynn’s ‘We’ll meet again’ appear as a post war sign of hope and promise. In many people’s lives, however, after the war the promise seemed to be broken as many fathers were lost and they never came home. The lyrics taken from Roger Water’s lyrics in Pink Floyd’s ‘The Wall’ depicts the shattered post war dream sentiment and is applied above the ‘glass ceiling’

2. The Death (demise) of the Post-War dream.- 1979-84

2022 mixed media

aluminium, rivets, timber, paint, LED lights, metal & wire

Does anybody here remember Vera Lynn?
Remember how she said that
We would meet again
Some sunny day?

Roger Waters 1979.

sung by Roger Waters of Pink Floyd

The second piece of work is titled The Death of the Post War Dream

This piece of relief art is based on personal memories of 1982, as a teenager experiencing the frightening news of IRA violence coming to the mainland UK, images of the Falklands War and with inspiration from Roger Water’s lyrics in Pink Floyd’s ‘The Wall’ - the absent father and post war society- the relief depicts the shattered post war dream sentiment of the grown children, of those fathers they lost in the war. In 1982 I watched the film ‘The Wall’ set to the music from Pink Floyd’s album.

The rose tinted glasses have gone and the world becomes real and raw.

The crumbled riveted aluminium is the smashed war plane set against the debris left behind. The pink light reflected in the metal depicts the demise of the Pink Panther cartoon character. He disappears from our screens in 1980.

3.Eulogy (memorial) to the post war dream

2022 mixed media Concrete, Styrofoam, timber, ink and paint.

The third piece of work is titled Eulogy (memorial) to the Post War Dream

This relief (no.3) is the Eulogy or Memorial to the Post war dream. The repeated pattern is taken from the dressing room wall of Architect’s  Peter & Alison Smithson’s House of the Future (1956) with a house designed for the year 1982, designed to be made of plastic.

‘the larger argument is that brutalism is a ‘structure of feeling’ that percolates through 1950s visual culture’ (Highmore .B. 2017)

This piece attempts to pay tribute to that house and that time of future projections and the childhood memories. The plastic shapes are inverted and projected with concrete to show a new celebration of ‘soft’ brutalism.

Childhood images are screen printed onto the flat surfaces of the concrete. One pink shape on each panel represents the memory of the Pink Panther.