JOHN GREEN surveys the remarkable career of screenwriter Malcolm Hulke and the essential part played by his membership of the Communist Party
On the warpath
HELEN MERCER casts an experienced eye over an ambitious exhibition that nevertheless contains painful gaps
The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Last Breath, Sister Midnight, Opus, and The Electric State
HENRY BELL is moved by the account of scientists under seige in Leningrad who preferred to starve rather than sacrifice their life-saving work
RUTH AYLETT recommends two anthologies: one that bears witness to refugee and immigrant experiences, and the other to our political relationship to water
SETH SANDRONSKY appreciates a fresh take on a 100-year-old novel that helps to contextualise the current moment of conspicuous wealth, waste and climate chaos
A no-nonsense ex-Garda female cop, Scandi-noir’s newest flawed hero, the lure of Aussie gold, and unexpected decency in Silicon valley
JAN WOOLF doubts that soft-core musical is the best way to transmit an important story of heroism and resistance
Women in Revolt! Art and Activism 1970-1990
Tate Britain, London
THIS is a significant, high profile and very political exhibition presenting “two decades of art as provocation, protest and progress.”
Chronologically, starting with the first women’s liberation conference in Britain in 1970, it spans second and third wave feminism (the first wave being the suffrage movement of the early 20th century). It ends somewhat arbitrarily in 1990 with a note on the commercialisation of art and the marginalisation of “artists engaged in socially motivated practices.”
For many of us caught up in the debates of the women’s movement in the 1970s the questions the exhibition raises retain much of their fascination and the diversity, awareness, experimentation and rawness of the output is nostalgic and heady. The exhibition is large, detailed and richly repays a visit.
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