Althea McNish: Designs without Borders

Abstract

Althea McNish (1924–2020) defies many of art history's borders. Born in Trinidad, McNish trained in London; her work crosses the line between fine and decorative art; and she brings the history of modern pattern design into dialogue with the history of Black British art. Focusing on her textiles of the 1950s and 1960s, this article foregrounds the multivalence of McNish's practice, exploring the productive tensions and possibilities that arise from her work's location at multiple points of intersection. Examining her treatment of colour and line, it demonstrates that McNish's textiles embody in their complex screen‐printed surfaces the composite, multi‐layered character of cultures and identities. The article considers McNish's participation in activism, and argues that her work prefigures the Black British Art Movement of the 1980s and global postmodern appropriations of the decorative by exploiting the subversive power of pattern.