Cathy's Art Diary

Stunning new statue in Parliament Square of the suffragist Millicent Fawcett. The statue was designed by the contemporary artist Gillian Wearing and I was a bit worried that it would be a bit alternative but in fact it’s a wonderful, classic figure. I loved the detail on it even down to the pattern of her tweed coat being defined in the bronze and the wonderful way her shoes peep out from under her skirt. I also liked the touch of including photographs of named suffragettes etched on marble plaques round the base. I was interested to see that it was a suffragist rather than a more militant suffragette that made into into Parliament Square, however Emeline Pankhurst isn’t far away in Victoria Tower Gardens, so it actually strikes a nice balance of representing all aspects of the fight for votes from women. Review Telegraph

A one day installation in Parliament Square organised by the International Rescue Committee on 19 September 2016. It appeared overnight and consisted of hundreds of life jackets all worn by children and adults when crossing the water between Turkey and the Greek island of Chios. It was done to coincide with the UN Migration Summit in New York. It was beautiful and looked like a field of colourful flowers from above but when you went down to ground level each one had been worn and was dirty and battered. It made you imagine the stories of the individuals who had worn them as well as the enormity of the migrant crisis.   I have seen so much contemporary art about the migrant crisis it's getting a bit repetitive but this was was such a simple idea and really effective.