“We are incredibly proud to have Valda’s piece on display at Dreamland. It is hugely powerful and is an important next step in the Mural-by-the-Sea project.”
Rebecca Ellis, Senior Creative Producer, Dreamland

These large billboards are constructed from images created over decades. Photographs taken fifty/sixty years ago are cut and pasted and positioned with studio images against a background of wood.

The figures represent the children whose parents came to Britain from the Caribbean between the 1940s and the 70s. Some children might have come here with their parents, some will have travelled the long distance alone; Some of the children were born here in the UK but there are those left behind who were, for various reasons, were never sent for to join their parent/s here.

When I shared a screen-grab image of the just-finished work with the poet and mentor Dorothea Smartt, she said that she was reminded of the 1984 painting by Sonia Boyce titled, “She Aint Holding Them Up, She’s Holding On (Some English Rose).
The work does appear to be in conversation with Boyce’s painting and I named it “Still Holding On”.

“Still Holding on (2)” was made for Spike Open 2019.

Still Holding On and Still Holding on (2) were displayed with a QR code with my voice recording as edited below: -

'For a brief period, before studying Fine Art in Bristol, I was Administrative Assistant at a Missionary College in Birmingham. I shared my office with one other, a woman in her fifties. By that time, her children were adults, but she had stayed home while they were young. In conversation one afternoon, my colleague said that she will never understand how women like my mother could leave their children, and travel across the world to another country for work. There is nothing, she said, that could have induced her to leave her children behind. Just in my twenties, I had neither experience nor words to argue with this woman, who from her privileged position would never have been called upon to submit to such a choice.

More than thirty years on, and a mother myself, I understand that colleague’s strong feelings. But I also know what it must have taken for my parents, particularly my mother, to leave us behind. I can only try to comprehend my mother’s distress on leaving. I’ve come to understand the hows, the whys of those life-changing decisions. For my mother, in 1960s Jamaica, there was an absence of choice; but there was hope. There were ambitions for her children; and an impossible dream. So, on a premise; an invitation from the British Government, eventually she came.
My parents worked.

Three years later, my sisters and I joined them here.
We stayed. And they continued to work. They supported their children while helping the extended family back home. Personal dreams had to be relinquished. Sacrifices were made. Both my parents laboured. They and many others from the Caribbean joined forces with the workers of Britain, They did the hardest work, heavy industrial work. Tough long hours. And always, they paid their taxes.

Ten years ago, my junior-school child came home one Friday and said that for homework she must interview her parents and grandparents. She had to find out where we all came from and how she came to be born here in Bristol. Her father told her his story; and that he came to Bristol from Brent Knoll, Somerset, to study. Our daughter already knew this.
I told her my story that she already knew: - Born in Jamaica, grew up in Birmingham. Came to Bristol to study Fine Art. And it was here at art college that her father and I met.
Days later, my daughter ran out of her class waving her homework book. “I got two gold stars”, she said. And she could not wait to show me. I checked out the golden stars. And I saw her teacher’s comment written in red underneath: -

“How fascinating. Great work !
I would like to know under what circumstances your grandparents were invited by the British Government to come and work here.”

I was still wearing my ‘Well Done’ smile as I read it. And I didn’t know whether I should howl with laughter, or with tears.

How is it that in such a short space of time, this important part of our British history is already forgotten? How is a generation, who came here, played their part in re-building this country, just ignored? How has their significant contribution to our society become so hidden that teachers leave our universities, and they don’t know. They teach our children; and they don’t know about our government’s vigorous recruitment drive in the Caribbean and other Countries. Why are they not taught about Britain’s plea during the 1940s and 50s for workers to come here and help rebuild post war Britain?

The following day, I mentioned it to a friend who happened to work in the school. I expected her to feel, as I did, a sense of injustice. A valuable piece of our history was being denied.
My white friend defended the teacher.

“The teacher was just a young girl. She couldn’t possibly be expected to remember any of this. It all happened before she was born. She’s a lovely girl and she really cares about the children.”

Yes. but I wanted her to see a wider picture. This wasn’t at all personal. It wasn’t about one individual’s living memory.

My friend, to my dismay, was angry with me. She said: -

“It was very naughty of you getting your daughter to write that bit about the British Government. You knew what you were doing Valda; but you wanted to make a point, didn’t you?

It’s really embarrassing for the teacher. It was wrong of you. You’ve humiliated the poor girl.

And it was unfair of you to use your daughter to make your point.”

Finally, my friend said: -

“And to be fair, Valda, your daughter wouldn’t have known any of this, if you hadn’t told her.”

Yes. Precisely!
My daughter could not have known if I had not told her. Which is why I had to.
This is a part of our history. It must be told.’

©Valda Jackson 2018