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HELEN BRADLEY | “Dear Me”, cried Miss Carter (who wore Pink)
"Dear Me", cried Miss Carter (who wore Pink), "Jane's talking to the Policeman" (A Diptych)
Leftside: 61 x 66 cms, 24” x 26” / Rightside: 61 x 52 cms, 24” x 20½"
Oil on Canvasboard
“Dear Me”, cried Miss Carter (who wore Pink), “Jane’s talking to the Policeman” and Mother, the three Aunts and Grandma (and the dogs Gyp and Barney) were all outside James Alfred Buckley’s Chemist Shop. We were late coming home from visiting Great Aunt Jane up Springhead and Aunt Frances was in a hurry to speak to James Alfred (they had a secret understanding) so George and I were forgotten and being small we got caught in the rush of mill workers hurrying home. George started to cry “Mother, where’s Mother?”, I can hear the Thing which lives up Springhead roaring and it’s coming nearer. It will bite all of our heads off “Dear Dear”, said the kindly mill women, “What shall we do with these poor Children,” but big Joe the P.C. soon heard George and we hadn’t far to go before reaching home and the year was 1906.
- Helen Layfield Bradley
- Helen Bradley began painting her unique and charming narrative scenes at the age of sixty-five. She painted in order to show her grandchildren what life was like when she was a child. The artist transmuted her childhood memories in the everyday life of ordinary Lancashire mill folk into anecdotal art. Characterized by the frank and inhibited outlook of a young child, her bright, teeming pictures and her own delightful narrative, memorably reflect that gentle period. Primitive in style, idyllic in mood, Bradleys pictures are as accomplished as they are imaginative.
