Kendall Francis, a conservation fellow at the National Gallery in London, UK, is researching the legacies of colonialism, slavery and exploitation in artists’ materials. She has started with the ancestral stories of the gallery’s paintings and what they reveal about colonial indigo plantations. The blue dye and pigment, which is extracted from the leaves of plants, is used and represented in a number of the gallery’s works. Artist, educator and researcher Christina Peake hears how Kendall’s research reveals histories that are not explicitly portrayed in the paintings and highlights the important contributions from a wider range of people, including the enslaved people who cultivated the crops and extracted the indigo against their will.
Interview by Christina Peake with Kendall Francis
