Catalogue essay by Blanche Llewellyn

This striking composition was painted around 1960 in the basement kitchen of a large house on the canal side near Regent’s Park, London. The model was a Nigerian student nurse. The painting is one of a series of conversation pieces that Rachel Reckitt undertook in the 1960’s, which included subjects such as boys on bicycles, queues at bakers, or gossiping women in the street.

For the subject of this painting, Rachel Reckitt may have drawn inspiration from “The Maids” (Les Bonnes), a play by French dramatist Jean Genet. First performed in Paris in April 1947 at the Théâtre de l’Athénée, “The Maids” was based on a true story revolving around Christine and Léa Papin, two sisters who worked as maids for the Lancelin family in Le Mans during the 1930s. A violent confrontation between the Papin sisters and the matriarch of the household on February 2, 1933, led to the discovery, by the authorities, of Madame Lancelin and her daughter’s unrecognisable mutilated bodies. The Papin sisters were subsequently arrested and confessed to the murders. This crime stood out as one of the most publicized cases in French news history. Its extraordinary violence, ambiguous motivations, and the psychiatric questions it raised made it a singular case. The portrayal of the sisters as either bloodthirsty criminals or victims of bourgeois oppression and class struggle divided opinions and ignited debates among philosophers, writers, and politicians.

In turn, Reckitt’s painting may have been the inspiration for Paula Rego’s ‘The Maids‘ (1987), which bears a striking resemblance. Rego’s emphasis on an unnerving scene echoes the ambiance present in Reckitt’s work. In Rego’s artwork, ambiguity surrounds the question as to whether one maid is combing Madam’s hair or if she is poised to strangle her, adding to the disquieting atmosphere.