A few years ago I did a site-specific piece of work influenced by the history of the foundlings and the Foundling Hospital which was relocated from its London site to the town where I now live. The Foundling Hospital building is still there but it is now a state run high school. One of the most moving histories of the foundlings was the love tokens which the mothers left as a means of identification should they ever be in the position to come and collect the child and take them back into their own care. Unfortunately they never did. These love tokens are on view in cabinets at the Foundling Museum which is situated on or near the original Foundling Hospital. The aim of my piece was to connect the present use of the site with its histories. I thought about what a modern day equivalent of a love token from parent to child could be and the mobile phone seemed like the most obvious. I cast in plaster 117 mobile phones (the number of initial foundlings on the register) and also created series of blank white gesso panels (representing the cold institutionalised aspect of the foundlings and questioning our own identity).
Installation views and detail of w84me, 2007
117 plaster cast mobile phones, 9 gesso panels
I will be going along to the Foundling Museum to see how the artists Mat Collishaw, Paula Rego and Tracey Emin have responded to the same topic.
Wednesday 27 January – Sunday 9 May 2010
Admission £7.50 // concessions £5 // children free
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