Over the past two decades Baird has often created her art at the ‘kitchen table’, surrounded by the chaos of everyday life amid children and an aging mother, but always with a sidelong glance at the world outside. She deals with the refugee crisis and the war in Ukraine in several of her more recent watercolours, in which the artist herself often stands powerless among the horrors. In her latest installation she takes on the war unfolding in Gaza with at strong artistic commitment. 

Please note that the room installation “You Must Never Go Down to the End of Town if You Don’t Go Down with Me” contains intense depictions of the brutality of war and human suffering.
  
The exhibition alludes to the repetitive nature of our lives, as well as the way significant events from one day to another can completely change our daily existence. At at time when you can always decide to look away, Baird insists on confronting the uncomfortable truths right before your eyes. 

Go Down with Me demonstrates how Baird's art evolves through repetitions and variations of the same themes, but also how they are influenced by private and political events. In her early works on gigantic canvases, we see Baird representing herself as young, thoughtful and yearning. Many of the images refer to male artistic geniuses – from Rodin to Munch – highlighting the underlying feminist perspective of the exhibition.

Image above: Untitled (from Chloé Blouse / Family and Friends), 2017, Watercolour, © Vanessa Baird / BONO. Photo: Øystein Thorvaldsen. Courtesy: the artist and OSL, Contemporary, Oslo