Exhibition review: Lowry's one track vision

Amalia Loizidou

The exhibition "Lowry and the painting of Modern Life" at Tate Britain (until 20 October) has quite a rich collection of Lowry's work depicting industrialised Britain. This "painter of modern life" worked from the 1920s until a few decades later.

"I've a one-track mind. I only deal with poverty. Always with gloom," Lowry said. Lowry was a Conservative voter. But two things are almost always present in his work - factory chimneys and crowds. He was painting what he saw in his rounds as a rent collector.

As he started developing his art in the 1920s and 1930s, times of economic depression, crowds and factories would inevitably mean his focus would be on what those times meant for the working people and poor of the north of England (being a Northerner himself).

In one room entitled 'The Social Life of Labour Britain', the paintings show scenes such as evictions ('The Removal', 1928), fatal diseases ('The Fever Van' 1935, where ill children were taken from their homes to hospitals, often never to return again) and auctioneers (pawn shops, 'Jackson's Auction and Saleroom', 1952).

These are easily comprehensible in today's austerity Britain of benefit cuts, bedroom tax, along with the dismantling of the NHS, pawn shops and pay day loan companies becoming part of working people's daily lives.

Lowry's work, painted during the Great Depression and the post-war recovery, is shockingly relevant today. There are more similarities between our lives and those of the crowds in his paintings than differences.

Donate to the Socialist Party

Finance appeal

The coronavirus crisis has laid bare the class character of society in numerous ways. It is making clear to many that it is the working class that keeps society running, not the CEOs of major corporations.

The results of austerity have been graphically demonstrated as public services strain to cope with the crisis.

The government has now ripped up its 'austerity' mantra and turned to policies that not long ago were denounced as socialist. But after the corona crisis, it will try to make the working class pay for it, by trying to claw back what has been given.

The Socialist Party's material is more vital than ever, so we can continue to report from workers who are fighting for better health and safety measures, against layoffs, for adequate staffing levels, etc.
When the health crisis subsides, we must be ready for the stormy events ahead and the need to arm workers' movements with a socialist programme - one which puts the health and needs of humanity before the profits of a few.

Inevitably, during the crisis we have not been able to sell the Socialist and raise funds in the ways we normally would.

We therefore urgently appeal to all our viewers to click here to donate to our Fighting Fund.