ABSTRACT
EARLY IN 2007, as we were putting this book together, I glanced at the arts page of the newspaper. Top of the Critics’ Picks column (Guardian, 20 January 2007) was ‘the incomparable Bobby Baker’, appearing at the Oxford Playhouse that night. The word ‘incomparable’ tells us something about the unique complexity of Baker’s work. She is best known for her performance work, running from Drawing on a Mother’s Experience in 1988, through the Daily Life quintet of shows in the period 1991-2001, and on to How to Live, which opened in 2004. These shows have toured around the world. Baker’s work as a performance artist has raised issues about femininity, families and food in sufficiently complex and interesting ways to have inspired many academics and commentators to try to tease them out. These debates are reflected in this book, which includes contributions from scholars with expertise about these issues. Few of these commentators on Baker’s performance work, with the exception of Marina Warner, have paid much attention to the specifically visual aspects of this artist’s work. Perhaps what is most interesting in Baker’s work, an ingredient of the adjective ‘incomparable’, is that her work cuts across any strong distinction between the visual and the performing arts. One aim of Redeeming Features of Daily Life, is to illustrate (not least, literally) the complementary forms of artistry running through her work.
