Veronica Ryan, the 66-year-old artist behind Britain’s first permanent public artwork to honour the Windrush generation, has won 2022’s Turner Prize. You can see Ryan’s giant fruit sculptures on Narrow Way in east London, a stone’s throw away from the African- and Caribbean-flavoured market that inspired them: Hackney’s Ridley Road.
Ryan’s trio of huge tactile marble and bronze sculptures are as vivid and warm as the community around Ridley Road market, which she fondly remembers visiting as a child, after arriving in the UK from the Caribbean. Her custard apple, breadfruit and soursop pieces look like they’ve just tumbled from a giant fruit and veg stall in the sky.
They are a million miles away from the coldness or just plain naff-ness of so much public art, and were commissioned by community art organisation Create London, which has been responsible for so many imaginative, award-winning and genuinely accessible public artworks in the city over the last decade.
Shockingly, Ryan’s Hackney fruits are not only the first permanent public Windrush commission in the UK but the first permanent public sculpture by a female Black artist. It’s good to see the Turner Prize – which is staged in Tate Liverpool this year not at its usual London home – honour Ryan, who at 66 is its oldest-ever winner. Ryan wore her father’s hat while accepting the award, and shouted ‘Visibility!’ and ‘Power!’ from the podium.
The UK needs to do more to recognise and celebrate marginalised citizens and talent, and big prizes and public monuments are a way to shine a spotlight. It’s not easy to get a train to Liverpool right now, but you can always take a trip down to Ridley Road and Narrow Way, to stock up on some real Caribbean fruit and veg, get a slice of London diversity and see what all the artistic fuss is about.
See Ryan’s sculptures on Narrow Way in Lower Clapton, E8 1HL.
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