On the 7th June, 2016, one hundred and fifty years to the day since the campaign for women’s votes began, New Dawn, an artwork celebrating all the individuals involved, was revealed in Westminster Hall, the oldest part of Parliament. New Dawn is located above the entrance to St Stephen’s Hall, the site of numerous demonstrations, so that viewers of the artwork will literally stand in the footsteps of the hundreds of thousands of women and men who came to Parliament to fight for women’s right to the vote.

New Dawn is a contemporary light sculpture and a permanent addition to the Parliamentary Art Collection, as well as the first piece of abstract art commissioned for permanent display in the historic palace. Measuring over six metres high, the massive scale of New Dawn is intended to reflect the size of the campaign, and the unique hand-blown glass scrolls that make up its dawning sun reflect the many individuals who were involved in the movement and the special contribution they made to modern democracy.

The artwork draws on the visual language of Parliament itself. The scrolls are a direct reference to the Act Room at the Parliamentary Archives, where the legislation which brought women the vote and a say in the laws that govern them is stored. The glass scrolls are mounted on a portcullis structure – the principal emblem of Parliament – raised over the entrance to St. Stephen’s Hall, symbolising women’s long-awaited access to democracy.

The circular scrolls combine with the metal portcullis to create 168 distinct ‘Venus’ symbols, representing the women who fought for their right to vote. New Dawn has also been influenced by the campaigners it celebrates. The rainbow of colours used in the artwork reflects the numerous organisations that were involved in the struggle, including the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies, the Women’s Social and Political Union, the Women’s Freedom League and the Men’s League for Women’s Suffrage.

The title of the piece comes from the language of the campaigners themselves, many of whom conceived of the vote as offering a ‘new dawn’ for women.

The lighting of New Dawn’s sun shape will rise and fall over a twelve and half hour cycle, linked to the tide of the Thames.  The ebb and flow of the illumination reflects the ever rising tide of change that campaigners were certain would bring women the vote in time.  Each scroll is individually lit, and the appearance of the artwork will change moment to moment, encouraging onlookers to consider the work more deeply and to reflect on the value of the vote and women’s role in democracy.

New Dawn was revealed on the 150th anniversary of John Stuart Mill MP presenting the first mass petition calling for women’s votes in the House of Commons. This date is generally seen as the beginning of more than seventy year’s campaigning for the vote, involving hundreds of thousands of people across the UK.

Placed on the route to the public viewing galleries, as well as the public tour route, New Dawn will educate, inform and inspire the one million visitors who pass though Parliament doors each year.

Red Tents 2.

4th July 2020 The Gallops, Michelham, Surrey.

My very first public artwork was in March 2003.  It comprised 28 illuminated red tents sited on a hillside, over three days and nights on a new moon. The work was commissioned for International Women’s Day. The piece examined the taboo of menstruation.

The tents had no openings, the internal world of the piece remained private. Perhaps that was a reflection of my own self at the time, a young mother.

Seventeen years later I wanted to remake the piece. I stripped the tents bare, with just their frames illuminated, glowing red in the dark, a majestic rawness within the encampment, nothing to hide. If you looked for too long, they would burn your eyes.

This time I showed the piece on a different hilltop, on a waxing moon, marking being very close to the end of a cycle. The piece was filmed from dusk till dawn using drone, time-lapse film and photography.

Balance.

Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) Residency: 2021

 In Spring 2021 I joined two other fine artists to hold the first artist’s residences for RHS Wisley. Over a period of 7 months, I worked with the staff and community, recognising that they were the key to the success of RHS science, gardening, and messaging.

I designed a programme of workshops to celebrate the knowledge and enthusiasm of the people at the gardens. Forty staff and volunteers all contributed to themed conversations. We focussed on the notion of the gardens as a living heritage collection and the fine balance of elements needed for sustainable gardening. How could we creatively convey those messages through working with the arts?

The resulting artwork was a thousand-piece hand-made porcelain light installation, suspended six metres under a great Oak at their Hilltop site, over winter 21/22. 

Harvest. Light sculptures, 300m x 250m field, 66 x LED Bales. 

Harvest is a site-specific intervention on farmland beneath Box Hill, Surrey.

In developing this project, Branson explores the relationship of the local farming community to the land, the processes and rituals of harvest time and the impact of the changing climate on their business. Harvest is an illuminated artwork highlighting some of the unseen work that goes into shaping the landscape that is often taken for granted.

Our changing climate has had a particularly damaging result on farming this year, with the drought causing a much-reduced crop. Branson’s installation features sixty-six ‘skeleton’ bales – illuminated outlines, arranged in a farmed formation across the lower field.

 ‘It’s a rare privilege to be able to create an art work for such a beautiful location. Observing the fields’ harvest cycle has been a real eye opener, seeing the delicate balance faced each season with the increasingly extreme weather conditions. This is the story that has shaped my installation’. Mary Branson, 2018.

Engaging with groups of different ages, Mary is sharing this hidden work as well as her own process as an artist. The piece will culminate in a community celebration of the landscape at the Box Hill viewpoint on the 29th September 2018. The celebratory event will include traditional singing from community choirs and a special calling event led by artist Alison Carlier - from the artwork to viewpoint and back.

The installation will be lit from 15th-29th September, dusk until 10pm every Saturday and Sunday. The light installation will be visible from Salomon’s Memorial, enabling viewers to see the work from a distance and also at closer proximity through guided night time walks.

For more information, please visit http://www.surreyunearthed.org/

Ladders of Light… A new constitution for the UK.

February 5th - April 3rd, 2019 Salisbury Cathedral.

 An exciting new work from two artists, the award-winning poet and broadcaster Lemn Sissay MBE and fine artist Mary Branson. The installation in Salisbury Cathedral explores the possibility of a ‘new charter' for the UK when we leave Europe. Put into care as a child, Sissay's poetic constitution reflects on our duty to the most vulnerable in society, particularly children, while Branson’s ethereal, illuminated ladders are a metaphor for a socially mobile pathway to a more just and equal society. The installation encourages the observer to look up towards a higher plane, to cross divides and overcome barriers. A powerful blend of poetry and visual art, the work both mirrors the grandeur and aspiration inherent in the Cathedral's Gothic architecture and conveys the fragility of our community. 

Ladders of Light is a Storyvault commission for Sky Arts 50 and is curated by Jacquiline Creswell, Salisbury Cathedral’s Visual Arts adviser.

‘And he took one of the stones, and put it under his head, and he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven. And the Lord stood beside him and said:  thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south. And in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed.’

Genesis 22:18

‘As I write about my future installation Ladders of Light (All the families of the earth be blessed) the British government are about to decide on how to leave the European Union.

As a child of the 70’s, I have enjoyed the benefits of growing up and working in an environment where I felt a close connection to our European neighbours. I wanted my son to have the same experience. I worry for his future and the younger generations, facing a very different setup in which they have had no voice.

Whatever my personal vote, I’m a pragmatist. If we are to become a distinct Island again, then I to look to the people to create a just, equal and caring society.’ 

Ladders of Light responds to the huge elevations of Salisbury Cathedral, inviting the viewer to raise their eyes upwards within the sacred space, the giant columns like tree trunks piercing the mists that loom over the land. 

‘Using this framework, I imagine mental bridges like huge synapses, spanning up and across the cathedral, the multiple ladders turning the space into an ethereal building site, encouraging us to reach out to restructure a new society.’

Seeing the ladders in the context of the Christian building one sees the parallels in Genesis’s Jacobs’ ladder. 

The stone pillow on which he rests his head are the hewn Chilmark stones which anchor the work to its foundations. The rungs linking man to heaven (perhaps a better place than we in are now) and the command from God in creating his church: “All the families of the Earth be Blessed”- a message of equality across all nations.

Twenty eight tent structures sited on the Mount overlooking the town, and illuminated from dusk until dawn for three day and nights.

The inspiration for the work came in part from a novel – ‘The Red Tent’ by Anita Diamant.  It is a biblicalstory set in Syria around 1500BC and portrays the strengths of female relationships in pre-modern society.  It tells of the way in which, in some cultures the women of the village who were menstruating would stop work, separate themselves from the group, and move together into huts or tents away from the centre.

Red Tents is a representation of this rite. In placing the light installation away from the town centre but still in view, I wanted to illustrate the subtle separation of the experience which reinforces the uniqueness of the female sex.