Matrons, Nurses, Mothers
A new exhibition exploring the presence of women in the York Residency Museum.
Over eighty percent of those who lived and worked in the building were women.
This is a sensitive interpretation of the sites use as a maternity hospital and female staff quarters.
Matrons, Nurses, Mothers explores the lives of women who lived, worked and gave birth in the building now known as the Residency Museum.
Built in the 1850’s as the Depot Superintendent’s Quarters, it is now the last remaining part of York’s Convict Depot, later becoming home to the Resident Magistrates hence the name, the Residency.
Highlights in this exhibition include a display of last century studio portraits of local mothers and their young children. A special addition is a textile by the museum’s IOTA24 Textile Artist in Resident Louise Wells. Made in response to the archaeological findings beneath the colonial floorboards in the exhibit room, Louise’s work reminds us of those who inhabited the room in the past and gives us hints of their lives. Offering a different slant on the building’s former uses, this exhibition will fill in the gaps of women’s history, when Matrons reigned supreme over their charges and babies not convicts were the focus of the day.