Romany Gypsy Artist Features in Major New London Art Exhibition

Traveller’s Times regular opinion columnist and fine artist, Gemma Lees, talks about her part in ‘Criminal’, a major new exhibition in London.

In a corner of London’s Finsbury Park sits The Museum of Homelessness (MOH), part gallery, part support hub, part perennial meadow, it’s in incredible place and I’m honoured to be a part of their latest exhibition, ‘ Criminal: An Untold Story of Homelessness, Resistance and Survival.’ which maps 400 years of criminalisation of homelessness and nomadic lives, with 10 Foot, Matt Bonner, Spelling Mistakes Cost Lives, and Surfing Sofas, in an exhibition that was co-curated and built by MOH’s members.

Having experienced homelessness in my twenties and growing up in a large Romany Gypsy family, I have seen firsthand how the law dictates Travelling people’s lives and penalises folks for having nowhere to stop, often due to a critical shortage of transit sites. A deep irony exists that a Gypsy or Traveller can own a trailer in which they live, park it in the ‘wrong’ place, have it seized and then become officially homeless, only to be added to a list for homes that may never be assigned to them.

Cold Comfort/ Kushti Shillow, examines a society that objectifies and commodifies, yet systematically chips away at our freedoms and represents us as criminals in the mass media. Inside a beautiful little fold-up caravan, I celebrate the everyday rebellion of Gypsies and Travellers that lies in a fierce preservation of traditional customs and crafts.

On one wall, eight embroidery hoops depict different laws that have targeted us, from the Egyptians Act in the 1530s to 2022’s Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act. Quotes from each of these are depicted on pastel bunting, othering language such as, ‘Every idle or disorderly person’ and ‘Gipsies and other persons of nomadic habit’. The text is white and difficult to see until you look closely, as is the nature of anti-Gypsiysm and hatred against Travellers. The proggy rug delves into this further. On the surface it’s beautiful but look closely and you will see rags that say, ‘I’m not being funny but’ and ‘I’m not racist but’, the beginnings of sentences that we dread hearing from people we’ve come to like.

China plates are printed with The Sun’s 2005 ‘Stamp On The Camps’ campaign and a similarly prejudiced headline from April this year, along with an iconic scene from the 2011 Dale Farm eviction, an action that left scores of families displaced. More Sun headlines are printed onto three cushions that spell out, ‘Home/ Sweet/ Home’, the letters corrupted with the newspaper’s criminalistic language of invasion, words such as, ‘military operation’, ‘illegal’, ‘chaos’, lang grab’, ‘bulldozers’, and the rather bizarre, ‘want to buy my dog for £250’.

Said Matt Turtle, co-founder and director of MOH: "The caravan is part interactive, part installation, part social commentary, people are drawn in by its beautiful interior, then bombarded with articulate and intelligent messages about Gypsy, Roma and Travelling people. It will become an important lasting legacy, treasured by the homeless community long after the exhibition closes."

Said Jake Cudsi of ‘Pavement Magazine’: "This is a really pretty way to tell a horrible story. Comfort is a really interesting word, trappings of home when people’s homes are being destroyed and erased."

Said Katie Langford of Arts and Homelessness International: "What I found powerful about this work was the way it uses warmth, craft and familiarity to reveal the realities of prejudice faced by Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities. The caravan feels deeply personal and comforting, but throughout the space there are these quieter traces of hostility, from legislation stitched into embroidery, to media headlines printed onto domestic objects. I was especially moved by the rag rug, where hidden fragments of casual racism emerge the longer you spend with it. It felt incredibly honest, tender and politically sharp all at once."

Criminal runs until 25 July. The museum is open on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays

(12.30pm – 4.30pm). Entry is free and donations are encouraged. More information at:

https://museumofhomelessness.org/whatson

By Gemma Lees

(All images courtesy of Gemma Lees. Lead photograph caption: Gemma in the Cold Comfort/ Kushti Shillow caravan with the Acts embroidery hoops and bunting.)