The Cozy Corner

After a couple of months reflecting over this Coming-of-age, dystopian novel, I finally have fathomed the words that can partially justify why anyone should read The Water Cure. Sophie Mackintosh’s novel was gifted to me by a close friend for my 21^st birthday after a wonderful evening involving lots of cocktails and even more book recommendations. For this gift, Sam, I will forever be grateful. Mackintosh’s insightful and striking novel gives a universal insight into the feminist world of the stand-alone woman and the power of women combined. It is a must read for any woman that looks to understand the power of herself and the importance of the women surrounding her. Like water can wash us away and wash away, this book gives note to the empowering feeling of women unalike in a world often seeming to be set on independence.

Three sisters Grace, Lia and Sky live on an isolated sunshine filled island and are raised by their parents, Mother and King. The water around the island is contaminated and so is the land surrounding that, they are raised on the island by their parents who escaped to this deserted land in order to safely raise their daughters post-apocalypse. The three daughters, each with wildly different personalities are raised to believe that it is unmanageable emotions, specifically men’s emotions that caused the destruction they hide from. They are taught to supress these emotions, and train themselves to no longer feel them by means of physical punishments, the worst which is called the water cure.

Then one day their King leaves the island for resources and does not return. Then when three men arrive on the island and Mother, Grace, Lia and Sky are without protection, their world of protection seems to spiral out of reach. Inspired by Shakespeare’s King Lear, Mackintosh’s influential novel utilises the extremities of post-apocalyptic dystopia to provide a metaphor for the disadvantage of female limitation. As these women are supressed to conform to a safe and ‘good’ character idealisation, Mackintosh provides an example of the destructive nature of conforming to male idealisation and objective gaze. As each daughter alternates as the narrator, we begin to understand their suffering due to this, the physical punishments and their psychological detriment due to this.

The water that surrounds them turns from restricting to replenishing, and Mackintosh writes this beautifully. Each chapter is strikingly open and bare, tense in its movement yet naturally imploring. Unlike most feminist dystopian novels, Mackintosh does not utilise an awful world to demonstrate how ours is paralleled in her fiction, but instead provides a microscopic and detailed version in the family of the three daughters, Mother and King. As we are given an insight into the minds of each daughter, women of all personalities can relate in one way or another and understand that confinement and expectancy should only come from oneself, that women like these cannot be categorised and expected to follow a stereotype created by men. And so, as the novel continues to reveal more truths about the world in which these women are confined, it is impossible as a reader not to feel a yearning for self-liberation and independence. To avoid your own water cure, and find peace in your waters.

On a day trip to London in late May I found myself with a few hours spare to explore around Oxford Circus. Despite the sometimes overwhelming multitude of brands and shops to explore in the surrounding area, as a student with little money and a continuing thirst for knowledge after finishing my degree, I decided to explore a nearby gallery. The Photographer’s Gallery was close and included a student half-price ticket so seemed like the ideal de-tour. Aside from a little research into photography in sixth form, I have a basic understanding of photography, but am hugely enthusiastic about exploring any form of art whether it be literature, sculpture, performing art or photography. Despite feeling a little unqualified to explore ‘The Photographer’s’ gallery, I was instantly welcomed by the staff at reception with warm smiles and compliments on my dress.

The Photographer’s Gallery did not disappoint. With seven floors of light open spaces displaying award winning artwork, a café and a bookshop, I was in my element exploring from the top floor downwards. In order to ensure I understood as much as possible from each exhibition I read the information provided and explored work from around the world. This began with Arwed Messmer’s RAF- No Evidence / Kein Beweis, which provided an enigmatic alternative interpretation of photography as a provider of evidence, looking specifically at the Red Army Faction and police recording of the death of student Benno Ohnesorg, Messmer’s depicted of the lack of evidence found from photography seemed an intriguing oxymoron to begin my visit. From this point I moved into Northern Iraq with Susan Meiselas who explored the seemingly unknown history of the Kurdistan. Meiselas’ work expanded over 5 centuries of research into uncovering the anonymous deaths of 100,000 missing Kurdistan homicides. Meiselas’ work provided a touching insight into the world of the hidden survivors of a massacre across 4,000 villages and provides a voice for those that Western society has yet to fully discuss.

On the fourth floor of the gallery I moved to view Mark Ruwedel’s work in Northern American landscapes, focusing on abandoned deserts, nuclear testing sites and other areas of land marked by the hand of human kind over time. Ruwedel’s environmentally impacting settings alongside his artistic talent to capture them, provided him the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize of 2019.

By this point I had been relatively moved by the work portrayed and felt satisfied with my experience at the gallery. As I moved onto the final section of the fourth floor I was met with the sound of Donald Trump’s infamous voice claiming that women undergoing abortions should be punished for their crime. As I begun reading the introduction to the exhibition I could not help but feel my heartbeat quicken and my leaflet become damp from the sweat of my palms.

“Drawing on the history of reproductive rights, [Laia Abril] questions the social and political motivations of contemporary ‘lawmakers’ who continue to erode women’s reproductive rights, creating a comprehensive overview of the triggers, stigmas and taboos concerning the termination of pregnancies.”

Despite Laia Abril’s work being originally published in 2017, due to the recent social media uproar regarding Northern Ireland’s absurd abortion laws, this exhibition could not seem more relevant. As I continued my walk around the room filled with real women sharing their stories of illegal abortions alongside their portraits captured by Abril, I could not help but feel ashamed to not have done more to act against the ongoing inhumane rights against women aside from sharing a post on Facebook. Each woman’s story was entirely different, but they all had something in common: they were unjustly forced to put their bodies and freedom at risk due to their countries’ laws deeming the life of an unborn foetus more important than their own body as a woman. Many of the women reported of travelling to different countries alone and of being denied essential medical care due to it possibly affecting a pregnancy they did not want in the first place but were forced to carry to term. Abril’s collection is raw and clinical at points, providing a clear-cut portrayal of what women have gone through in the past and what they continue to suffer in the present.  Her multi-media exhibition includes examples of ineffective and dangerous forms of contraceptives from the 19^th century, including half a squeezed lemon that often got stuck in the uterus and caused infections in women. A television set in the centre of the room provided examples of contemporary ‘lawmakers’ (all male) providing their opinion on the topic.

“Promoting abortion […] is a way of limiting the concept of the human being.” “Planned Parenthood [US abortion clinics] has been far more lethal to black lives than the KKK ever was.”

As a young woman born and raised in England, I have never questioned what it would be like to be forced to put my body at risk of death for the sake of another potential life due to the laws of my country not allowing me to have an abortion. Never have I questioned whether I would be kept alive if brain dead and pregnant, despite by family’s wishes, in order to save a life that is not yet living, as happened November 27^th, 2014 in Ireland. It fills me with fear to think that women across the world and on the other side of my homeland in the UK are experiencing this every day, and due to Abril’s powerful depiction of this through photography, I was brought to tears just as these women often bring pregnancies to term, against my will.

As I left the exhibition I felt my skin prickle with anger as I watched other art lovers quickly walk through the exhibition without giving it much more than a glance. I wanted to grab them by the arm and pull them back to see what they had missed, to force them to focus on what is evident in front of their eyes and to react to it, to act upon it. But not everyone is interested in this topic. Many readers will get half a paragraph through this review, lose interest and return to their Instagram stories full of dog videos and doughnut pictures. Philosopher Peter Singer argues that people are incredibly unlikely to help children starving on the other side of the world, but almost everyone would stop to help a child drowning in a lake. This is because of his argument of relativity. If an issue is presented to you and is close to your heart, you are more likely to act. Those that run the Race for Life each year almost always have someone in mind to run for, a personal purpose. So how do we change this? With issues as large as this happening across the country, Abril is providing a perfect example of presenting issues to people through the form of photography, yet it is still being ignored by many. What can we do?

Talk.

In her new book We Are Displaced, Malala Yousafzai claims that any action is best. Whether this be devoting your life to an issue you believe in, opening your home to refugees or working full-time in a mental health clinic, or volunteering in a school for disabled children on the weekends, or simply discussing issues such as unjust abortion laws with others. Everything has an impact. In a world with so many rising issues it is impossible to conquer it all. So do what you can and provide an incentive for others. A five-minute chat about climate change with a stranger in a coffee shop could result in them googling to find their nearest zero-waste shop or remembering to bring their own bag to pick up groceries. Abril has shared photographs and stories of these women affected and it has lighted a fire in me. It has motivated me to act on these issues and share her work. I started the day wondering what I can do with my summer before I start my post-graduate course in September. Now I am inspired to look into volunteering, to look into campaigns that I can contribute to in order to work towards a change, to support women in traumatising positions and attempt to provide an outlet for women that are primarily affected by the unlawful rules of their bodies that their government have decided on. Educate yourself, expose yourself to the problems that require attention and be part of a change.

The artistic approach to Jordan Peele’s film Get Out includes the use of photographs as metaphorical objects for the representation of black people in contemporary America. As the world continues to become more and more digitalised, with the average American spending three hours on their smartphone per day, this contemporary film suitably captures this importance and the power that photographic art can contribute to change. This change is imperative. ‘In 2009, the face-recognition technology on HP webcams had difficulty recognizing black faces, suggesting, again, that the process of calibration had favored lighter skin’. This not only demonstrates the prejudice black people face day to day but is an example of how black people are literally not seen from the white perspective. With this facial-recognition failure, Peele utilises the art object of photographs to encourage people to awaken to the racism that surrounds them, and the difference black people witness.

The film’s soundtrack begins with Redbone by Childish Gambino, the lyrics ask the audience to ‘stay woke’, a term often associated with the Black Lives Matter movement which automatically indicates to the audience the overall theme of the film and the ideologies of the main character, Chris. We are given an inside look at Chris’ apartment that is covered in his own photographs, mainly of African American children in the city. ‘These photographs are one of many reminders of Jordan Peele’s artistry in establishing the contrast between black and white as well as emphasizing the importance of perspective’. This alternate perspective is resembled through the objects of the photographs that have been taken in urban area rather than the upper-class white household with architecture of the southern tradition that follows from this location. This contrasting perspective of reality is further established in this scene when Chris and his partner Rose discuss his concerns about meeting her parents without them being aware that he is black. Rose’s response is that her dad would have vote for Obama for a third term if he could have. This contrast between the common reality in which black people often experience racial prejudice and are negatively represented, compared to Rose’s nonchalant yet racially categorising response further validates Peele’s intentions. This contrast of character focuses on the concept that ‘white and black Americans view the same situations through very different lenses [and this] is something [Chris] already understands’ as can be seen through his awareness of potential future experiences of prejudice and racism in environments where black people are misrepresented or not represented at all.

Once Chris reaches the family garden party, this difference is vast compared to his surrounding company of white people. Due to this, ‘despite King’s (or Hayworth’s) odd appearance, it is Chris who sought him out, admitting to King that he felt much more comfortable after spotting him among the guests’. When Chris realises that he recognises King, it is the art object of the photograph he takes that seems to wake Hayworth from his subconscious trance. The photograph is used to demonstrate the contrast between the black and white perspective, between the harsh reality of racist contemporary America of which we need to ‘stay woke’, and the unrepentant silencing of black people throughout history that is symbolised through ‘the sunken place’. ‘It is only when Chris snaps a photo of Logan that the African American man, whose body Logan’s white consciousness was transplanted into, wakes up’. This is powerfully captured later again through Peele’s use of the silent auction scene which misuses the object of Chris’ photograph to subjectify his body as a black man to the white family’s desires. As the auction deliberately connotes slavery without a word of script, Peele clearly captures how the perspective of black people is of silent repression, whereas the perspective of white people is oblivious and often accepting of this being a possibility.

This acceptance yet partial obliviousness to racism is further seen when Chris interacts with the gallery owner Jim Hudson. Despite his physical blindness, Hudson has artistic appreciation for Chris’ photographs which emphasises the importance of Chris’ art being well known. Hudson claims that ‘“[t]he images [Chris] capture[s], [are] so brutal, so melancholic”. What the gallery owner is suggesting here is that Chris’s photographs lay bare the brutality of the world around him’. Not only does Hudson’s recognition of Chris’ tonally despondent photographs prove his decision to admire their beauty rather than their sorrow, but additionally reiterates the concept of white people having an alternative perspective than that of black people. Throughout the film Chris continuously utilises photography to gain a sense of reality in the dystopian environment in which he has found himself. He takes photographs of the psychologically enslaved which wakes them from the trance of ‘the sunken place’.

The sunken place is Peele’s metaphorical juxtaposition of staying ‘woke’, the sunken place represents the subconscious silencing of black people in contemporary America. Despite how far racism seems to have come, people are still blind to the prejudice black people face in the twenty-first century. No one has represented this silencing more powerfully through photographs than Emmett Till’s mother.

For what turned out to be an untruthful claim that fourteen year old Emmett Till had sexually harassed a white woman, his body was graphically mutilated by two white men and he died over half a century before the average age of death at the time in the US. After his body was returned to his mother, ‘authorities in Mississippi tried to bury the teenager as quickly as possible, his mother, Mamie Till Mobley, insisted otherwise, allowing photographers to commemorate the ghastly scene’. Emmett’s body was publicly accessible at the funeral and photographers were encouraged to publicise his grotesquely mutilated body. Mamie Till Mobley refused to stay silent of the mistreatment of black people, including her son. ‘“[People] would not be able to visualize what had happened, unless they were allowed to see the results of what had happened,” she later said. “They had to see what I had seen. The whole nation had to bear witness to this”’. Peele powerfully demonstrates this prejudice and unjust epidemic through the art object of photography inside his artistic film. The horror genre of ‘the sunken place’ not only sheds light on the psychological impact of this for black people in society but becomes an outcry for much needed attention to a blind audience of white people.

Despite living in the twenty-first century, the combination of commonly occurring racism and sexism still leaves black women held at prejudice in contemporary America. Throughout history black women across America are unheard, undefined or objectified and defined by others art. Robin Coste Lewis’ book Voyage of the Sable Venus homes in on this entirely, by representing the lost, broken and unwillingly defined black women of art objects throughout America. Lewis’ ‘narrative poem[s are] comprised solely and entirely of the titles, catalog, or exhibit descriptions of Western art objects in which a black female figure is present, dating from 38,000 BCE to the present’. Her book sheds light on this topic whilst providing an alternative platform that allows black women to define themselves. ‘One could write the word “Untitled” repeatedly on a piece of paper every day for the next hundred years without stopping, and you’d never reach the end of female namelessness’. Lewis’ work attempts to undercut the tragic denigration of African American women, that uses history to define black girls before they are even born.

One of history’s most common stereotypes of black women is that of the ‘Sapphire’ caricature—the typically depicted shrew of society: the angry black woman. First created in the 1930s comedy show Amos ‘n’ Andy, Sapphire is an example of the racist preconceptions of black women that continue in contemporary society. The backlash that American professional tennis player Serena Williams faced over her controversial US Open loss gives evidence of the ongoing objectification of black women in artistic objects such as magazines. It was not her loss of game that caused controversy, but her reaction to the referee’s calls ‘which the Women’s Tennis Association has since decried as “sexist”’. The backlash from her angered reaction in the game resulted in a Sapphire-like cartoon of Williams being publicly published. The object of this cartoon depicted Williams in an ape like pose and a tantrum like rage, ‘[t]his contrasted with the depiction of Osaka, whose father is Haitian and mother Japanese, “as white with blonde hair”’.

Whether Williams’ behaviour was inappropriate for the court or not, the racist denigration and debase that she received through this art’s objectification was unjust and continues the negative stereotypes of black women. The cartoon’s comparison of the two women of different skin colour indicates a racial bias against Williams, which ultimately contributes to the misinformed opinion of the general public in believing that black women are too emotionally unruly to play amicably, be mothers, and to teach. Bell Hooks explains that women like Williams, as ‘radical black female subjects are constantly labelled crazy’. This indicates that despite her public platform, due to the prejudice against her, Williams is unable to be heard.

These unwanted titles that connote times of slavery, the Mammies, Jezebels and Sapphires of stereotypes, or simply the lack of identity of being an ‘untitled’ black woman is prominently discussed in Lewis’ Voyage of the Sable Venus. Lewis’ use of language techniques such as enjambement and double entendre give further value to the titles that the art objects she references have been given, emphasising their racist and degrading nature.

‘Statuette of a Woman Reduced

to the Shape of a Flat Paddle’.

This beginning couplet of Lewis’ poem Catalog 1: Ancient Greece & Ancient Rome mentions of an object seen to be defined as a black woman yet is given no detail of name nor features. Lewis’ use of enjambement brings focus to the word ‘reduced’, highlighting the effect of this on the black woman that has become the object. She is reduced to simply the shape of her body. Like a shadow, her background and colour are simply blackness and nothing more. She is untitled.

Later, in Catalogue 1, Lewis writes of a:

‘…Lion Devouring a Black Head

of a Black Nude Black Serving Girl’.

These black women are consistently fragmented, pulled apart and put onto display, they are never left to preserve themselves as whole. The repetition of the capitalised word ‘Black’ only puts further focus on how these object women are perceived simply for their stereotypical representation as a ‘black […] girl’. As Lewis’ poetic art object re-appropriates the titles of museum objects, it sheds light on this objectification that is being presented through art to susceptible young black women in contemporary America. Lewis’ ekphrastic art renews this categorical analysis of women into a journey of recovery and agency, she allows black women of America to embark on a voyage away from misogynistic and racist subjectivity and towards their own personal identity, as mothers, as doctors and as teachers of the future.

Lewis’ book ultimately uses these objects of prejudice and confinement to present a more hopeful future for black women in contemporary America. Her book provides freedom and repair for the women of artistic objectification, it allows them to sail away on a ‘ship [that] [is] an ark—and all of them [are] singing and cackling’. However, she also emphasises that unless society alters the way we allow black women to define themselves, they will never be able to thrive as individuals. If black women are consistently told that they are not fit to be teachers or mothers, then how can we expect black women to strive? Olivette Otele is the UK’s first and only black female history professor. For Otele, this is not something to be proud of. She claims ‘[she doesn’t] want to be the UK’s only black female history professor’, as black women are so misrepresented and excluded from history, it is essential that women like Otele are given the opportunities to continue to influence future generations, so that the young black girls of the next century are something other than ‘Untitled’.

African Americans throughout history have often been misrepresented in art objects such as photographs, sculptures and paintings. This is something contemporary African American artists and writers have explored, exposed and reappropriated through their art to produce relevant and powerful work that speaks of the ongoing race issues in America. Their works hold power; they are, as examined in this series of articles, as Bell Hooks depicts; ‘a rebellious desire, an oppositional gaze’ for people that refuse to be silent, people who know that racism is still alive and well. For example, negative representation of slaves in the daguerreotypes that Carrie Mae Weems uses in From Here I Saw What Happened And I Cried, are a prime example of the type of historical racism in art that has misrepresented black people for generations. As Weems utilises these racist art objects to transform artistic representation, Michelle Wallace’s viewpoint remains prevalent through the re-appropriation Weems undertakes: ‘The history of the period has been written and will continue to be written without us. The imperative is clear: Either [black people] will make history or remain the victims of it’.

Weems reappropriated Louis Agassiz’s slave daguerreotypes to echo that this emancipation is yet to arrive. As the owner of the daguerreotypes, Agassiz has since been seen to have forced the slaves to be photographed almost nude to assist the scientific research into polygenesis of black people and white people. Despite claiming ‘that his beliefs on racial typologies were without political motive’, when writing of his first encounter with a black man, Agassiz stated:

it [was] impossible for [him] to repress the feeling that they are not of the same blood as us. In seeing their black faces with their thick lips and grimacing teeth, the wool on their head, their bent knees, their elongated hands, their large curved nails, and especially the livid color of their palms, [he] could not take [his] eyes off their face in order to tell them to stay far away.

Weems uses Agassiz’s photographs, which in turn sheds light on the awful circumstances in which they were originally created. However, her use of altering the colour of the photographs, and partially covering them with text avoids any possibility of parallel association between the two works. Rather than accepting Agassiz’s warped theories and emotionally graphic photographs as truth, Weems has reworked them and questioned them in the process, which ultimately disempowers the photographs.

Although the work of Agassiz is disempowered, the stereotypes that the slaves in the photographs were presumed to portray are emphasised through the text that Weems adds to each photograph.

‘YOU BECAME MAMMIE, MAMA, MOTHER & THEN, YES. CONFIDANT-HA’.

Weems gives further context to the narrative of her collection, utilising the misrepresentation of the slaves as they would have been stereotyped to work both with and against the subject of Agassiz’s gaze. As the slave woman stands firm and looks directly into the camera, she seems to gaze back defiantly to subvert her stereotype of ‘Mammie’. Rather than elaborating on these racist perceptions, Weems focuses on the people themselves, giving them each a new individual representation that contrasts the text of the image.

Weems’ art works as a reminder of how art’s historical representation of race is still a contemporary issue for African Americans. Agassiz’s photographs were put on display by Harvard University at the ‘Amon Carter Museum in 1992’. Fifteen slave workers were displayed around the room, still under scrutinising gaze. ‘In what seems to be a deliberate refusal to engage with the camera or its operator, they stare into the lens, their faces like masks, eyes glazed, jaws clenched’. The cycle of misrepresentation continues, and just as ‘Georgetown University decided to give an advantage in admissions to descendants of enslaved people who were sold to fund the school’, claiming that society are aware of the past and accept that is happened is not enough to break this repetitive cycle. African American people are aware that slavery happened and that their ancestors were exploited. To publicise the work of Agassiz does not mend anything for those most affected by the photographs. By altering the photographs, Weems breathes new life into the enslaved subjects of the work. Her work ‘make[s] visible the structures behind the creation of stereotypes, in order to disrupt their continued repetition and effectiveness’. Weems’ art is not a form of closure but is a visual demonstration of finding a new sense of power in contemporary art and utilising it to emphasise the parallels between past and present racism in America.

However, Weems has not ignored or focused on the past in her work. She only selected, enlarged, and recontextualized [the photographs]. […She] viewed their lives empathetically from a black point of view. She saw these men and women not as representatives of some typology but as living, breathing ancestors. She made them portraits.

These images are brought into the twenty-first century by Weems. We are reminded that they were individuals rather than experiments, a person rather than ‘a scientific type’, and these people are still present today. Through both their ancestors and the representation of African Americans through reappropriated artistic objects such as Weems’, the positive representation of black people of history lives, despite the racist ‘domination that would contain it, open[ing] up the possibility of agency’ for the future generations to come.

The work of Leonardo Da Vinci, art or science? Five hundred years since the death of such a renowned polymath, it can sometimes be difficult to remind ourselves of what this man represented in regard to his work. With some of his eternally famous work including his influence on a flying machine and perfectly proportioned figures with technical notes beside them, it can be difficult to remember Da Vinci for his personality in addition to what we see on the page.

As one of twelve children to his father, Da Vinci has little childhood historical evidence aside from the basic facts and figures. He had little relationship with his siblings due to their age gap, including his youngest sibling’s birth occurring when we was forty years old. In amongst all of this, it seems clear that it would have been difficult for Leonardo to gain some limelight. As a young man in a small town called Vinci in the Republic of Florence, he did not seem the obvious choice for his later international legacy and fame. However, Giorgio Vasari- 16th century biographer of Renaissance artists recognised Leonardo’s talent. Vasari describes Leonardo ‘as a very young man: A local peasant made himself a round shield and requested that Ser Piero have it painted for him. Leonardo responded with a painting of a monster spitting fire that was so terrifying that Ser Piero sold it to a Florentine art dealer, who sold it to the Duke of Milan. Meanwhile, having made a profit, Ser Piero bought a shield decorated with a heart pierced by an arrow, which he gave to the peasant.’

However, Leonardo has always been one to drive curiosity in others. As a incredibly secretive man, we simply know he was a vegetarian, and since the 13th century there have been continuous speculation in regard to his sexuality. Due to his close and loving relationship with two his male pupils, Salai and Melzi. In the past two centuries it has been decided by deduction that Leonardo was likely to be homosexual, which is believed by some to have effected his paintings John the Baptist and Bacchus. With such an in depth analysis and discussion of Da Vinci’s personal life in the 5 centuries since his death, including from Sigmund Freud, there is obvious emphasises that he is simply an everlasting moment as an person, let alone an artist.

The current exhibition in The Cardiff National Museum celebrates exactly that diversity of character. The work displayed seems to specifically focus not on the astounding scientific accuracy behind Da Vinci’s art but instead the personality of the artist himself.

Although a relatively small exhibition, this temporary experiences uses Da Vinci’s work to captures alternate parts of himself and his interests, including descriptions to give a further insight into the process behind each piece. Besides scientifically perfect drawings of the artilleries in the female body, the museum display other drawings, including what Da Vinci preferred to call ‘the ugly body’, a profile caricature like sketch of a man Da Vinci claimed to be unattractive, showing his humorous perspective on the human figure he understood so well.

This exhibition is not something solely based in Cardiff. As a national celebration of Da Vinci’s artistic influence, twelve galleries across the UK are temporarily displaying these works of Da Vinci to specifically embody his passion for what he drew, such as anatomy, geology and botany. The 144 pieces currently on display throughout the galleries will eventually come together for two major displays in The Queen’s Galleries in Buckingham Palace and the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh. As a man who with sculptures and buildings now demolished, and anatomical work never published, the paintings and drawings of Da Vinci remain an integral and essential selection of his work that continue on as a legacy of an outstanding man. The opportunity to visit his work so locally to Cardiff University is something that cannot go unmissed. This is an experience that generations to come will not reach, and therefore deserves each student to take a moment out of their weekly schedule and visit.

The last time any Leonardo Da Vinci work was displayed in the National Museum of Wales was in 2007. Before roughly 90% of current UG university students had even started secondary school. Before America experienced a black president, and before the first iphone. So much change occurs in spaces in time like this including our opportunities. Wales Online describes the current display on our doorstep as ‘an unparalleled insight into Leonardo’s investigations and the workings of his mind.’ I urge you, take a moment in between lectures, avoid that 3 for £5 jagerbomb deal, and educate yourself in a way your education can’t!

A drawing of the plant Job’s Tears reminds the viewer of Da Vinci’s passion for plants in their natural beauty rather than just through scientific means. The relaxed nature of the simple plant on the piece of paper before us, emphasises that despite his almost seemingly omniscient experience and powerful legacy as a scientist, this piece remains a visual reminder that he believed that ‘simplicity is the ultimate sophistication’.

The Cardiff exhibition itself is not on its own in using this significant moment in time to comment on the life of Da Vinci. Galleries around the UK are all temporarily displaying these delicate pieces that have managed to remain intact for the past five centuries. Therefore, if you decide to go see this exhibition, remember to keep your ticket as this will grant you 50% entrance fee for the Da Vinci exhibition in Bristol.

Overall, even for those that have little knowledge of Da Vinci’s influence throughout history, this exhibition marks the importance of his work over time and reminds us of Leonardo Da Vinci himself. Of the ever adored man, that was such that the King of France carried him away like a trophy, and was claimed to have supported him in his old age and held him in his arms as he died. Just like this movement, artists nationally have decided to hold up Da Vinci like a trophy, in the legacy of his artwork. They still comprehend the often forgotten talent of people of the past. So through this exhibition we are asked to remember him. Not as a famous prodigy, or a polymath, or even as an artist. Simply as the man he was.

This summer the first book I attempt to devour before returning to the expectations of my September reading list is I am Malala. Published in 2013 when the author was only 16 years old, an autobiography of the girls’ education advocate and youngest ever Nobel Prize laureate; Malala Yousafzai. In 265 pages Malala answers the question ‘Who is Malala?’ as asked on a secret school bus in Swat by a Taliban assassin, that ultimately lead to Malala being shot in the head for speaking out for something often taken for granted.

As I earnestly turn page by page on a gorgeous beach in Portugal, relaxing after the stress of second year university expectations, I cannot help but feel empowered and incredibly grateful for the circumstances that have allowed me the education I shamefully attempt to escape from in a week abroad. A girl the same age as myself, Malala reveals her desperate efforts of hiding books under her shawl and passing by the severed heads of police officers on her way to school, and eventually having a bullet to the head, for something I have always struggled to wake up for.

A girl of passion and indignant determination to have what she deserves, Malala represents the powerful voice of all disadvantaged girls. No matter what, she continued her education and continued to fight for girls’ right to education across the world. Malala continues her work throughout the world and has recently spent her twenty first birthday promoting her fantastic non-profit organization ‘Malala Fund’ in Brazil.

This book is personally empowering, promotes awareness of an often tragically dismissed issue and is impossible to put down until finished. I highly recommend it to anyone that wants an eye-opening realisation of life beyond your back garden.