The surname, Rookes, of the women who ran The Widow’s Coffee House was an irresistible pun. Rooks are notoriously clever gregarious birds. Rookery isn’t just where rooks nest, it can also mean deception or trickery. Bird is a derogatory word used for a woman that objectifies her as a simple sexual thing. As I went through what documentary evidence survived about The Widow’s Coffee House, it became clear that these women had been successful, well-off, and were cherished by respectable friends. Because they were successful women operating in a business world dominated by men, they inevitably became associated with C18 London coffee house scandals about women who didn’t just work in coffee houses, but were also thieves and prostitutes.
I wanted to make work that included rooks, images of the Rookes women, and a silver coffee pot, which the last of the women had owned and left in her will. The coffee pot was a high value high status object that seemed to me an ideal symbol of their success and respectability.
I also needed to create a free voucher that visitors could use at the museum instead of paying an entrance fee. At the same time, another reason I thought this story would have other layers was that Bury today is celebrated as an attractive town because of its thriving ‘cafe culture’. Coffee shops and the women who work in them today epitomise respectable success. I had recently seen Tania Kovats’ exhibition Oceans at the Fruitmarket Gallery in Edinburgh. Although her subject matter, oceans and water, had nothing to do with coffee houses, she had collaborated in a way that seemed to me perfect for representing many layers of perception. She had collected samples from seas and oceans worldwide by inviting members of the public via social media to participate.
I made a Coffee Token that visitors could find and collect from coffee shops in Bury to use as admission vouchers. It incorporated my own version of a C18 coffee token, which was an illegal coin created by coffee houses in those times when wars had led to a crippling cash shortage. Rather like the financial crisis in Britain since 2008. I had approached Bury’s coffee shops, and many agreed to offer my tokens as well as collecting used foil coffee bags for me to use in my work. Here is my token:
I used the collected coffee bags to make three rooks for an installation in the museum. They were to represent a worthy Rooke, a business Rooke, and a tarty Rooke. I created a nest for them filled with coffee paraphernalia from as wide a timescale as I could gather.
I also created two ‘portraits’ of Widow Rookes’ daughters, painted in acrylic on broken coffee cups, pots and saucers glued to marine ply. I wanted them to look disrupted or complete depending where the viewer was. I’d been inspired by the plate paintings of Julian Schnabel, but couldn’t use his scale or oil paints because there wasn’t room in the alcove the Museum was letting me use, and no time for oil to dry.
Finally I made a giant ‘silver’ Coffee Pot and Stand as close in style to one the Museum agreed might have been the one left by Letitia Rookes in her will. I installed this as close to the site of The Widow’s Coffee House as I was allowed. This gave me an excuse to contrast the pot with the bright green summer grass of the graveyard. I fixed an information card to the installation directing viewers to the town’s coffee shops and my coffee tokens, so they could easily find the pieces in the Museum itself.
