Andrea Kim Valdez
During the late 1970s and early 1980s, when I was living in Holloway and working part-time at The London Hospital, I was a member of a local Women’s Group as well as The London Hospital Women’s Group. Coach trips to Greenham Common were organised by women from the Islington groups and I travelled with them on a number of occasions. I remember we took cakes and other food and sang all the way to Greenham. On one journey there was great excitement as we passed cruise missiles being transported in the other direction along the motorway!
I had two small children at the time and so I never stayed at overnight. However, I did take my 4 year-old son on one trip. I distinctly remember the embarrassment I felt, when, excited by the soldiers, the guns, and the overhead helicopters, he put his hands in his pockets and pointing his fingers outwards ran along the roadside shouting “ Bang bang bang bang bang ” at the top of his voice.
Embrace the Base
I was there on at least four or five occasions, and later made a series of ceramic artworks about the experience. For the day of Embrace the Base, I took my daughter’s nappies and photographs of my family and friends and put them up on the fence. Someone took my photograph in front of them, and I used this in my ceramic Triptych “Embrace the Base” which was recently shown at the Barbican Art Gallery in the exhibition “ReSisters: A Lens on Gender and Ecology”.
Embrace the Base – Part 1 of Triptych, Embrace the Base
Part 2 of Triptych, Embrace the Base, the base inside out
Part 3 of Triptych, Embrace the Base
The triptych celebrates three different days/actions at the base. The day we “Embraced the Base”, the day of “The Base Inside Out”, when we held up mirrors to the soldiers inside the base, and the night of “Halloween” when the fence was cut.
Woman playing violin at Greenham Common
I cannot remember which gate we usually visited, they had names like Orange or Green, and I remember this as being somewhat of a political choice. I remember it as winter on these visits, always wearing warm clothes as we sat down for a long time, blocking a gate, and singing rounds and other endlessly repetitive songs. On one occasion a woman played the violin and I also celebrated this event in a ceramic plaque.