Gateway to British Art Prize 2025
Second place: Caterina Eastman
A young woman is staring at me. She’s the first in a line of schoolgirls who creep up to meet the viewer, two friends huddled beside her. There’s an expression they wear; one I know all too well. Pity. Their faces are laced with a little secret, too—like they’ve been talking about me. I couldn’t pass by Schoolgirls by Sir George Clausen, because its presence was like an oilpainted brick to the face. It’s a special kind of lonely to be a part of something, yet to be a part of it wrong. When you’re born as something—anything—you become part of an unspoken club with rules and expectations. Girls aren’t any different. But I was. When rules defy your soul, other people notice, and they make sure you know it. Schoolgirls presents fragments of womanhood in a way that forces the viewer to question social expectations of gender.
Our biological need for company is how humans conquered Earth. To follow social expectations is, at its core, survival. The schoolgirls exemplify female expectations. They wear polite colors that are easy on the eye, in poses that are proper, gentle, and well-trained. The woman in the back is dressed head to toe in black; even from afar, her presence is domineering. She’s making sure they stay in line. Growing up, I was messy, loud, geeky, and worst of all, I was weird. Girls were Nice and Normal, and they had everything in their notes color-coded in highlights with heart-dotted i’s. As a kid, I found myself the only girl in a group of boys, and the only “boy” in a group of girls. Different. Even now, although I’m closer in age to the young women in the painting, I connect instead to the old woman watching them from the street. She carries a bitterness I find myself in more than I care to admit. She’s holding two heavy-looking milk buckets. Perhaps she envies their wealth, their beauty, or adolescence. I remember a boy told me I had the face of an old lady. Maybe I had the jealousy of one, too. Femininity is associated with politeness, youth, and falling in love. Women are taught that they are on a timer before age steals those away. Yet, an older woman is still a woman. And I was still a girl—just not enough of one.
Boys had an inherent excuse to be everything I was. Girls were everything I couldn’t be. Many girls silently judged me. Their pity stung. I began to resent femininity. “I’m not like those girls,” I would brag. But secretly, I yearned to be free from the new box I put myself in. I liked “feminine” things like fashion, romance, gossip. There’s another girl in the painting, cut off by the edge of the canvas. At first, I thought she was a boy. She holds out a flower to the line of young girls who pay her little mind. I see her in my newfound acceptance—freedom from restrictive gender roles that leave no room for nuance of self. Even now, I’m still not used to incorporating femininity into my presentation, but I like it, and that’s enough.
It’s funny that a painting by a man could reflect my experience so intrusively. I wonder if George Clausen only intended for the male eye to see this work, deconstructing femininity like a zoo for men to gawk at. But perhaps because he was also looking in from the outside, he could paint the spectrum of womanhood, and I could find myself in all of them.
Return to the Gateway to British Art 2025 Prizewinners page.