Broughton House Gallery

Helen Birmingham’s artwork inspired by Charles Darwin

Broughton House Gallery – June 27th to July 18th 2009

Broughton House Gallery is a uniquely suitable location for this exhibition, as it is the home of the Gwen Raverat Archive (she being Darwin’s granddaughter).

For the last three years Helen’s work (much of it mixed media) has arisen from her fascination with the science of heredity. The results are intriguing and beautiful. Helen is a many-sided artist who has combined practising art (including printmaking), experimenting with unusual techniques and materials, with lecturing and craft. This is how she describes her work:

My work attempts to illustrate the nature of ‘being’, whilst exploring and recording not only the changes which occur during the creation of the piece itself, but also exploring the evolution of ideas and images which occur as a result of that creation.

The exhibition is structured in three parts:

• Geology/Fossils
  rocks – earth movement – volcanoes – earthquakes – erosion
• Evolution
  tree of life – progression – stages of development
• Writings/Experiments
  postcards – letters – books – experiments – research

There is a Line (Voyage) of Discovery that runs through the whole exhibition.