Women Biting Back – A Review of Paula Rego | Obedience and Defiance
Exhibition at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art (Modern Two)
“I try and get justice for women... at least in the pictures. Revenge too.”
by Mira Knoche // written for The Leither
March 2020
With International Women’s Day on the horizon on 8th March, it’s a good time to enjoy some of the achievements by women who have pushed boundaries. One of the most important artists living in Britain today is currently exhibiting at the Scottish National Galleries of Modern Art – Paula Rego.
Paula REGO (b. 1935) Wife Cuts off Red Monkey's Tail, 1981 Acrylic on paper, 68 x 101 cm
Collection: Private Collection © Paula Rego, courtesy of Marlborough, New York and London
Paula REGO (b. 1935) Manifesto for a Lost Cause, 1965 Acrylic, crayon, graphite and paper glued on canvas, 183 x 152 cm
Collection: Calouste Gulbenkian Museum - Modern Collection © Paula Rego, courtesy of Marlborough, New York and London
Now in her 80s and living in London, where she studied at the prestigious Slade School of Fine Art, Rego was born in 1935 in Portugal. A country ruled for decades (1932 to 1968) by the self-appointed military dictatorship of prime minister Salazar, and the Catholic Church, Rego knew what it meant to live under an oppressive regime, particularly as a woman. She was politicised from an early age, growing up in a family critical of Salazar’s rule. Rego found an outlet for her critical awareness in her paintings.
In ‘Manifesto for a Lost Cause’ (1965) and ‘Salazar Vomiting the Homeland’ (1960) Rego’s abstract expression becomes an open protest against Salazar’s authoritarian regime. The latter to me brings across a reaction to her time, a free outburst, with the brushwork almost brutal, scribbled, crudely drawn in and painted across in what seems a wild enactment of anger and physical reaction against Portugal’s dictator. Both paintings are hung in a room filled with similarly expressive and semi-abstract semi-figurative works.
Full of vibrant sketches, detailed etchings, huge colourful paintings in a range of styles, and a lively documentary produced by her son, this exhibition, curated by Christine Lampert, is an overall enriching experience. I imagine those who don’t usually care much for paintings finding a way into this world. Spanning over fifty years of Rego’s international career, from the 1960s onwards, her images are subversive and imbued with a dark sense of humour.
Her partly Disney-inspired painting style renders serious topics a bit pop, bearable, even entertaining to look at, which her critics despise. In balancing the tension between disturbing and reassuring, however, lies her genius. Rego mischievously skips between ‘obedience and defiance’. Her comforting aesthetics, warm colours, approachable people, and animal figures tackle tough, controversial subjects – gender discrimination, poverty, abortion, female genital mutilation, political tyranny and war – with a light touch. Rego’s paintings are stories made up as she goes along, in major phases of her career painted sitting on the floor, like a child, rather than standing at an easel, the grownup way. Influenced by the mysterious and dark Portuguese folk tales of her childhood, Rego is a visual storyteller of the people. She brings art historical and political awareness together with stylistic influences from pop culture and her paintings ‘talk’ to viewers at eye level. She may be from a privileged background, but her solidarity lies with the disadvantaged.
Therein lies her genius, the fine balancing of ‘obedience and defiance’, of tackling controversial subjects with a light touch. Rego is a visual storyteller of the people.
In an interview for the 2018 ‘All Too Human’ exhibition at Tate Britain, where she exhibited work beside Francis Bacon, Jenny Saville, Lucian Freud, Frank Auerbach and more, Rego spoke about her interest in women’s perspectives:
Paula REGO (b. 1935) Painting Him Out, 2011 Pastel on paper mounted on aluminium , 119.4 x 179.7 cm
Collection: Private collection © Paula Rego, courtesy of Marlborough, New York and London
“I read a lot of books, like Simone de Beauvoir, and they had a great influence on me. ... It was exciting to think that women could do what men could do. It felt just. I don’t use the ideas directly but I try and get justice for women... at least in the pictures. Revenge too.”[1]
In ‘Painting Him Out’, Rego reverses the traditional relationship between male artist and female muse. The female artist here handles the male subject. Covered by a drape, and passively stuck – alive or imagined – onto a canvas, power roles are reversed in a room full of women observing, drawing, pleasing themselves. Sexuality and power, in relation to gender roles, are challenged in most of her work. At the same time, ‘Painting Him Out’ shows a formally arranged composition that rhythmically guides the viewer’s eyes across the painting and demonstrates Rego’s connectedness to the tradition of painting.
“I try and get justice for women... at least in the pictures. Revenge too.”
Rego’s curiosity in portraying women shows her intrigued by their experiences, good and bad, mischievous and seductive, cruel and compassionate. With mass media and art history steeped in imagery of male camaraderie and passively posing (nude) women, it’s refreshing to see a painter of Rego’s calibre centring her images around active, strong-legged and misbehaving women.
…it’s refreshing to see a painter of Rego’s calibre centring her images around active, strong-legged and misbehaving women.
Paula REGO (b. 1935) Untitled No. 4, 1998 Pastel on paper, 110 x 100 cm
Collection: Private Collection © Paula Rego, courtesy of Marlborough, New York and London
In the abortion pictures, Rego vented her angry compassion for women going through the painful and unsafe trials of illegal abortions, when a referendum in 1998 had just ruled out the legalisation in Portugal. Women are seen lying on sofas, crouching, cowering over buckets, looking straight at the viewer or not caring, and dealing with their pain. ‘Untitled No. 4’ shows a young woman in school uniform, recovering. The images paint an empathetic picture of women’s age-old experiences of unwanted pregnancies, defiance of the stigma around abortion, sexual autonomy over their own bodies and describing moments of self-care. Women may be suffering but they are the protagonists here. The empathy provoked by Rego’s paintings supported a successful second referendum campaign in 2007, when abortion was finally legalised in Portugal, literally rescuing lives.
The images paint an empathetic picture of women’s age-old experiences of unwanted pregnancies, defiance of the stigma around abortion, sexual autonomy over their own bodies…
‘Angel’, the painting chosen for the NGS exhibition poster, shows Rego’s reimagining of Amélia, a character from the 1875 novel, The Crime of Father Amaro by José Maria de Eça de Quierós. The story goes that Amélia and the sly character of priest Amaro embark on a clandestine affair. This ends with Amélia dying a disgraced death at childbirth of their illegitimate child, and Amaro living on. Rego, of course, reverses this.
Paula REGO (b. 1935) Angel, 1998 Pastel on paper mounted on aluminium, 180 x 130 cm Collection: Private collection
© Paula Rego, courtesy of Marlborough, New York and London, Photograph courtesy Museu Paula Rego: Casa das Histórias Paula Rego, Cascais
Standing in an empowered stance and staring directly at the viewer, from a slightly elevated position, Rego’s angel Amélia faces any opponent that comes her way with a sword and sponge in her hands, the instruments of Christ’s passion. Her gaze is confident, calm, challenging.
Rego again manages to render acceptable a what is so widely perceived as threatening, the archetypal image of an armed, autonomous woman defending her kin - the calm, almost friendly, composure of the figure and sheer beauty of the painting strike Rego’s ingenious balance between unsettling and reassuring. She redefines the original story, by giving Amélia life and strength, with Father Amaro pathetically dwindling on other images. Amélia becomes guardian angel and powerful avenger of all women thus wronged. She heroically survives.
Rego’s paintings often seem like healing alchemy, giving pictorial justice to women across time and imagined spaces. She shows their many-faceted friendships, dealings with autonomy, deeper instincts and wonderfully complex relationships – all worth celebrating in the light of International Women’s Day.
“Paint is … liquid thought”, says the art historian James Elkin.
Many people seem to think paintings are static objects. As someone who regularly enjoys pushing paint across a canvas, I feel nothing could be further from the truth. How very alive this process is becomes obvious when you see Paula Rego’s paintings in the flesh.
Biog:
Mira Knoche is a Leith and Glasgow based visual artist, studying Painting & Printmaking at the Glasgow School of Art. She started up WENCH, a womxn-led art & music collective last year, encouraging womxn to become loud and visible.
Come along to the next event, #InternationalWENCHDay, a night of comedy, poetry, music and art for everyone, with Amelia Bayler, Iona Lee, Janette Ayachi, Jo D’arc, Leyla Josephine, Lou McLean and Sarah Irvine, on Sunday 8th March, 7.30pm, at The Waverley.
For the full lineup and £5 tickets: internationalwenchday.bpt.me
Twitter: @miraknocheart
PAULA REGO | OBEDIENCE AND DEFIANCE
23 November 2019 – 19 April 2020
Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art (Modern Two)
73 Belford Road, Edinburgh, EH4 3DS
0131 624 6200 | nationalgalleries.org
Tickets: £11.50-£10.50 online (Concessions available)
25 & under: £7.50-£6.50 | Free for our Friends
Free for our Friends
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