The sculpture explores issues of women’s equality and access, and how that access has changed over time.

The display of House of Doors and the issues it seeks to address deliberately coincide with the 100th anniversary of the Representation of the People Act 1918, which gave some women and working men the right to vote in elections. It was the culmination of many years of agitation, hardship and sacrifice by the Women’s Suffrage Movement, and signalled the beginning of the long struggle for equality that continues to this day.

To mark the centenary of that historic event, the Palace of Westminster is playing host to this work of art which pays tribute to the Women’s Movement’s hard-fought victory.

The centrepiece of the project is a resonant sculpture of a cloaked woman facing a vertical stretch of paving in place of a door. With this threshold denied, the woman has no way of passing to the other side. This haunting, evocative centrepiece symbolises isolation and exclusion - the reality for so many women both then and now.

But it would be a mistake to conclude this is a passive piece; the project, which has been touring since 2015, is immersive, interactive and empowering, giving visitors the opportunity to record their own thoughts on women’s struggle for equality, wherever in the world they may be. The primary focus of House of Doors is imagining - of futures, pasts and presents – and every proposal is documented in the project’s core text, ‘The Book of Love & Legislation.’

UCL Artist-in-Residence, Kristina Clackson-Bonnington, who devised and sculpted House of Doors, commented:

“This all started with a painting I came across in Canterbury- it's a life-size painting of a little girl standing at a door, painted in 1910. The painting immediately struck me as being of huge social significance; in 1910 the little girl standing at that threshold was excluded from so many places, but major social change was on the way. By creating this large-scale, participatory work and welcoming hundreds of people to the House of Doors - from young children to Parliamentarians - we can face this barrier together and imagine what a more equal society would look like.”

On the eve of International Women's Day 2015, in partnership with UCL Art Museum, the House of Doors was launched. UCL's Quad was reworked into the full, immersive version of the project and the first Members of the House of Doors (MHDs) were welcomed.

Dr Martine Rouleau of UCL Art Museum, who co-produced the event, commented:

"UCL was thought to be the perfect site to launch the House of Doors due to its historical ethos of equality. UCL was the first secular university in the UK, and the first university to admit female students on equal terms to men.”

Since its debut, the House of Doors has toured the UK – as well as the first and last countries in Europe to grant women the right to vote.

Kristina is now working on a related exhibition to mark the centenary of votes for women, entitled Female Firsts. This exhibition celebrates the achievements of 12 notable female alumni of UCL and will be completed in early December, when a special event will take place in its honour, opened by the Provost of UCL. The full exhibition will be on display in the South Cloisters of the University between 14th December and 2nd February 2019.

Courtesy of Kristina Clackson-Bonnington

Tel: +44 (0)203 108 9046

Email: colin.brook@ucl.ac.uk