Wikipedia

Kitchen sink realism

Kitchen sink realism(orkitchen sink drama) is aBritish culturalmovement that developed in the late 1950s and early 1960s in theatre, art,[1]novels, film and television plays, whose protagonists usually could be described as "angry young men"who were disillusioned with modern society. It used a style ofsocial realismwhich depicted the domestic situations ofworking-classBritons, living in cramped rented accommodation and spending their off-hours drinking in grimypubs,to explore controversial social and political issues ranging from abortion to homelessness. The harsh, realistic style contrasted sharply with theescapismof the previous generation's so-called "well-made plays".

A Taste of Honeyis an influential "kitchen sink drama". In this photo of the 1960 Broadway production,Joan Plowrightplays the role of Jo, a 17-year-old schoolgirl who has a love affair with a black sailor (played byBilly Dee Williams).

The films, plays and novels employing this style are often set in poorer industrial areas in theNorth of England,and use the accents and slang heard in those regions. The filmIt Always Rains on Sunday(1947) is a precursor of the genre and theJohn OsborneplayLook Back in Anger(1956) is thought of as the first of the genre. The gritty love-triangle ofLook Back in Anger,for example, takes place in a cramped, one-room flat in theEnglish Midlands.Shelagh Delaney's 1958 playA Taste of Honey(which was made into afilm of the same namein 1961) is about a white teenage schoolgirl who has an affair with a black sailor, gets pregnant and then moves in with a gay male acquaintance; it raises issues such as class, ethnicity, gender and sexual orientation. The conventions of the genre have continued into the 2000s, finding expression in such television shows asCoronation StreetandEastEnders.[2]

The term "Kitchen Sink School" was first used in the visual arts, where the art criticDavid Sylvesterused it in 1954 to describe a group of painters who called themselves the Beaux Arts Quartet, and depictedsocial realist–type scenes of domestic life.[3]

History

edit

The cultural movement was rooted in the ideals of social realism, an artistic movement expressed in the visual and otherrealist artswhich depicts working class activities. Many artists who subscribed to social realism were painters withsocialistpolitical views.[citation needed]While the movement has some commonalities withSocialist Realism,another style ofrealismwhich was the "official art" advocated by the governments of the Soviet Union and otherEastern Bloccountries, the two had several differences. While social realism is a broader type of art that realistically depicts subjects of social concern,[4]Socialist realism is characterized by the glorified depiction of socialist values, such as the emancipation of theproletariat,in a realistic manner.[5]

Unlike Socialist realism, social realism is not an official art produced by or under the supervision of the government. The leading characters are often 'anti-heroes' rather than part of a class to be admired, as in Socialist realism.[citation needed]Typically, protagonists in social realism are dissatisfied with their working class lives and the world, rather than being idealised workers who are part of a Socialist utopia in the process of creation. As such, social realism allows more space for thesubjectivityof the author to be displayed.

Partly, social realism developed as a reaction againstRomanticism[citation needed],which promoted lofty concepts such as the "ineffable" beauty and truth of art and music and even turned them into spiritual ideals. As such, social realism focused on the "ugly realities of contemporary life and sympathized with working class people, particularly the poor." (The quotation is from George Shi, of the University of Fine Arts, Valencia).[6]

Features

edit

Kitchen sink realism involves working class settings and accents, including accents from Northern England.[7][8]The films and plays often explore taboo subjects such as adultery, pre-marital sex, abortion, and crime.[9]

Origins of the term

edit

In the United Kingdom, the term "kitchen sink" derived fromexpressionist paintingsbyJohn Bratbythat contained an image of a kitchen sink.[10]Bratby did various kitchen and bathroom-themed paintings, including three paintings of toilets. Bratby's paintings of people often depicted the faces of his subjects as desperate and unsightly.[11][12]Kitchen sink realism artists painted everyday objects, such as trash cans and beer bottles. The critic David Sylvester wrote an article in 1954 about trends in recent English art, calling his article "The Kitchen Sink" in reference to Bratby's picture. Sylvester argued that there was a new interest among young painters in domestic scenes, with stress on the banality of life.[2]Other artists associated with the kitchen sink style include Derrick Greaves,Edward MiddleditchandJack Smith.[13]

1950s to 1960s

edit

Before the 1950s, the United Kingdom'sworking classwere often depicted stereotypically inNoël Coward'sdrawing room comediesand British films.[citation needed]Kitchen sink realism was seen as being in opposition to the "well-made play",the kind which theatre criticKenneth Tynanonce denounced as being set in "Loamshire", of dramatists likeTerence Rattigan."Well-made plays" were a dramatic genre fromnineteenth-century theatrewhich found its early 20th-century codification in Britain in the form ofWilliam Archer'sPlay-Making: A Manual of Craftmanship(1912),[14]and in the United States withGeorge Pierce Baker'sDramatic Technique(1919).[15]Kitchen sink works were created with the intention of changing that. Their political views were initially labeled asradical,sometimes evenanarchic.[citation needed]

John Osborne's playLook Back in Anger(1956) depicted young men in a way that is similar to the then-contemporary "Angry Young Men"movement of film and theatre directors. The" angry young men "were a group of mostly working andmiddle classBritish playwrights and novelists who became prominent in the 1950s. Following the success of the Osborne play, the label "angry young men" was later applied by British media to describe young writers who were characterised by a disillusionment with traditionalBritish society.The hero ofLook Back In Angeris a graduate, but he is working in a manual occupation. It dealt withsocial alienation,the claustrophobia and frustrations of a provincial life on low incomes.[citation needed]

The impact of this work inspiredArnold Wesker,Shelagh Delaney,and numerous others, to write plays of their own.[citation needed]The English Stage Company at theRoyal Court Theatre,headed byGeorge DevineandTheatre Workshoporganised byJoan Littlewoodwere particularly prominent in bringing these plays to public attention. CriticJohn Heilpernwrote thatLook Back in Angerexpressed such "immensity of feeling and class hatred" that it altered the course of English theatre.[2]The term "Angry theatre" was coined by criticJohn Russell Taylor.[16]

This was all part of theBritish New Wave—a transposition of the concurrentnouvelle vaguefilm movement in France, some of whose works, such asThe 400 Blowsof 1959, also emphasised the lives of the urban proletariat. British filmmakers such asTony RichardsonandLindsay Anderson(see alsoFree Cinema) channelled their vitriolic anger into film making. Confrontational films such asSaturday Night and Sunday Morning(1960) andA Taste of Honey(1961) were noteworthy movies in the genre.Saturday Night and Sunday Morningis about a young machinist who spends his wages at weekends on drinking and having a good time, until his affair with a married woman leads to her getting pregnant and him being beaten by her husband's cousins to the point of hospitalisation.A Taste of Honeyis about a 16-year old schoolgirl with an abusive, alcoholic mother. The schoolgirl starts a relationship with a black sailor and gets pregnant. After the sailor leaves on his ship, Jo moves in with a homosexual acquaintance who assumes the role of surrogate father.A Taste of Honeyraises the issues of class, race, gender and sexual orientation.[citation needed]

Later, as many of these writers and directors diversified, kitchen sink realism was taken up by television directors who produced television plays. The single play was then a staple of the medium, andArmchair Theatre(1956–68), produced by the ITV contractorABC,The Wednesday Play(1964–70) andPlay for Today(1970–84), both BBC series, contained many works of this kind.Jeremy Sandford's television playCathy Come Home(1966, directed byKen LoachforThe Wednesday Playslot) for instance, addressed the issue of homelessness.[17]

Kitchen sink realism was used in the novels ofStan Barstow,John Braine,Alan Sillitoeand others.[18]

Since the 1960s

edit

The influence of kitchen sink realism has continued in the work of other more recent British directors such asKen Loach(whose first directorial roles were in late 1960s kitchen sink dramas) andMike Leigh.Other directors to continue working within the spirit of kitchen sink realism includeShane Meadows,Andrea Arnold,Clio Barnard,andLynne Ramsay.[19]The term "neo kitchen sink" has been used for films such as Leigh's 2004Vera Drake.[20]

List of films

edit

List of plays

edit

See also

edit

References

edit
  1. ^Chilvers, Ian (1 January 2004). "Kitchen Sink School".The Oxford Dictionary of Art.Oxford University Press.ISBN978-0-19-860476-1.
  2. ^abcHeilpern, John.John Osborne: The Many Lives of the Angry Young Man,New York: Knopf, 2007.
  3. ^Walker, John. (1992)"Kitchen Sink School".Glossary of Art, Architecture & Design since 1945,3rd. ed. Retrieved 20 January 2012.
  4. ^Todd, James G. "Social Realism". Art Terms. Museum of Modern Art, 2009.
  5. ^Korin, Pavel, “Thoughts on Art”,Socialist Realism in Literature and Art.Progress Publishers, Moscow, 1971, p. 95.
  6. ^"Social Realism".Retrieved4 May2008.
  7. ^"Everything you need to know about Kitchen Sink Dramas - Reader's Digest".readersdigest.co.uk.
  8. ^MacCabe, Colin."A Taste of Honey: Northern Accents".The Criterion Collection.
  9. ^Ford, Lynsey (15 January 2016)."11 Films That Explore The British Class System".Culture Trip.
  10. ^"Art UK".Retrieved10 April2024.
  11. ^Ian Chilvers; John Glaves-Smith (2009). A Dictionary of Modern and Contemporary Art. Oxford University Press. p. 259.ISBN978-0-19-923965-8
  12. ^"John Bratby 1928–1992". Tate. Retrieved 6 January 2014.
  13. ^"Jack Smith obituary".the Guardian.17 June 2011.Retrieved26 October2022.
  14. ^Archer, William (1 January 2004).Play-Making: A Manual of Craftsmanship– via Project Gutenberg.
  15. ^J L Styan,Modern Drama in Theory and Practice I,quoted by Innes (2000, 7).
  16. ^John Russell Taylor.Anger and After,1962, London: Methuen.
  17. ^"Legacy of Cathy Come Home should fuel fury over homelessness".the Guardian.20 May 2016.Retrieved26 October2022.
  18. ^Schudel, Matt (3 August 2011)."Stan Barstow, British author of 'A Kind of Loving,' dies at 83".The Washington Post.
  19. ^Mitchell, W., "When kitchen-sink drama revolutionised British cinema,"The Telegraph,11 July 2017. Retrieved 2 January 2021.
  20. ^Hardy, Molly O'Hagan (2007)."Gendered trauma in Mike Leigh'sVeraDrake(2004) ".Studies in European Cinema.3(3):211–221.doi:10.1386/seci.3.3.211_1.S2CID96470436.
  21. ^"A ★★★½ review of Sparrows Can't Sing (1963)".letterboxd.
  22. ^"Georgy Girl".Empire.5 April 2006.
  23. ^"Where to begin with kitchen sink drama".British Film Institute.22 June 2016.
edit
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Kitchen_sink_realism&oldid=1259470488"