Bath’s VictoriaArt Gallery has just acquired a print by Turner Prize-winning artist Grayson Perry through the generosity of the Art Fund and the Friends of the Victoria Art Gallery.
The unusual self-portrait – called ‘Map of Days’ – will be hung in the building’s free upper gallery from Tuesday, 28 October onwards.
Rather than depicting the artist’s face, the portrait shows the inner workings of his mind, full of the preoccupations and pitfalls of modern life.
Perry said: “I’ve portrayed myself as a walled city. The wall, I suppose, in some ways represents my physical skin but at the same time it’s permeable. I absorb the influences and the ideas of the landscape I find myself in. I am as much my baggage as the person holding the baggage.”
Councillor Ben Stevens, (Lib-Dem, Widcombe), the Council’s Cabinet Member for Sustainable Development, said: “Grayson Perry’s ‘Map of Days’ is a fantastic acquisition for the Victoria Art Gallery and we are very grateful for the generosity of the Friends and the Art Fund for enabling us to purchase it. We hope that everyone who views it will find it intriguing and exciting.”
The work features in a new Channel Four television series entitled ‘Who Are You’ that began on Wednesday, 22 nd of October. Grayson Perry turns his attention to identity as he creates portraits from tapestries to sculptures and pots of diverse individuals who are all trying to define who they are.
“It’s a popularly held belief that in the middle of ourselves, our deepest, core-est identity is this sort of pearl, this immutable centre of who we are as individuals. I feel now that that’s a false belief. We perform ourselves over time. This is the thinking behind this self-portrait,” said Perry.
Grayson Perry will also exhibit his tapestries ‘The Vanity of Small Differences’ at the Victoria Art Gallery from 16 January – 10 April 2016.
For his new Channel 4 series, Perry spent time with Britons facing a moment in their lives when they needed to define who they are, and then distils his impressions of each of them into a portrait.
Some of the sitters become miniatures, some large tapestries, some statues and, of course, some pots, but all of the works will be shown in a special display alongside the portraits in the permanent collection of the National Portrait Gallery in London from 25 October.
The Victoria Art Gallery is open from Tuesday to Saturday from 10am to 5pm and on Sundays from 1.30pm to 5pm. It is closed on Mondays and Bank Holidays.
