"A Woman and her Maid in a courtyard"
By Pieter de Hooch, C. 1660
The Filthy Reality of Everyday Life
Wellcome Collection (London)
24 March - 31 August 2011
The Wellcome collection is showing an overwhelmingly strong exhibit about DIRT. How we surround ourselves with dirt, our reactions to dirt, provocations, fear or disgusts. Also magical factors like growth in soil or creations from clay, antibiotics out of sewage...
"There is no such thing as absolute dirt: it exists in the eye of the beholder."
Mary Douglas (Purity and Danger: An analysis of concepts of pollution and taboo" 1966.
The exhibit is divided into six parts of urban locations, to show us how Dirt represents a significant threat to our health but also that it is vital to our existence.
1) The Home (Delft 1683 -)
Showing how the the people of the Netherlands put a lot of effort into cleanliness at an early time, and how it was represented in their Art. Delft was the center of ceramics industry and it was well used in the kitchen and on floors, it kept a spotless look.
Plate showing an interior with a woman sewing
1650-1700 Ceramic. Delftware
2) The Street (London, 1854-)
From the horror of Cholera that was spreading through polluted water and the cleaning up of London´s streets and Homes.
A young Venetian woman aged 23, depicted before and after contracting cholera
Coloured stipple engraving.
"One 19th Century English newspaper report describes cholera victims who were one minute warm, palpating, human organism - the next a sort of galvanized corpse, with icy breath stopped pulse and blood congealed - blue, shrivelled up, convulsed. Cholera causes profuse vomiting and diarrhoea, dehydrating the body so rapidly and severely that the blood thickens and the skin becomes deathlike and blue." - Wellcome Library
A monster soup commonly called Thames water
William Heath 1828
The Brick - keepers Dance, Crossness Pumping Station
"Laid to Rest" by Serena Korda
3) The Hospital (Glasgow 1867 -)
How Joseph Lister changed Glasgow Infirmary from a highly deathly institution to an economic success story. Lister did this by introducing an antiseptic surgery, that improved the sanitation system in an overcrowded city.
Diorama of the Lister Ward at the Glasgow Royal Infirmary
Raw material washing hands (1996)
Bruce Nauman (Video)
Air balloon advertising Odol mouthwash c.1920
4) The Museum (Dresden 1930 -)
In 1911 Dresden held the first International Hygiene Exhibition and over 5 million visitors came. A success for Hygiene but also used by the ruling Nazi party and its racist ideologies. Hygiene now encompassed the science of racial hygiene, which taught that impure genes must be eradicated in order to create a physical and intellectual superior race.
Jews being forced to scrub the pavements of Vienna (1938)
5) The Community (New Delhi and Kolkata, 2011)
Showing how the Dalits (the broken people, formerly known as the untouchables) are paid a pittance to clear human waste often with hands. Over one million people is said to still do this even after the Government has tried to outlaw the "Manual Scavenging".
Savitri (age 30) a Dalit woman working as a manual scavenger,
Uttar Pradesh, India, 2010
Senthil Kumaran, 2007
Not a good picture by me... but you can see how this scavenger is without protective gear while he is cleaning human excrements from sewers and septic thanks.
5 Anthropometric Modules made from Human Faeces
by the People of Sulabh International, India
Santiago Sierra 2005-2007
6) The Land (Staten Island 2030...)
Fresh Kills, Staten Island
(Picture Village Voice)
Fresh Kills is a landfill that opened in 1948 for its immense amount of waste. It was the worlds largest in 2001, almost three times the size of Central Park. A horrible stinking place for the people of Staten Island, and I hear it is still reeking. The landfill is now being turned into a public park.
Aerial view of Fresh Kills Park in 2030
Rendering by James Corner Field Operation/Courtesy City of New York
Fresh Kills is being seen as a symbol of renewal and hope.
Although it is, it makes me horrified about where the rest of the garbage is going.
Must there be more HOPE!