Cammock Defends Churchill Video as Peers Slam
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- Helen Cammock's video 'Persistence,' installed at the National Portrait Gallery, triggered a letter from Lord Roberts of Belgravia — a Churchill biographer — signed by more than 50 peers, calling her comparison of Churchill's policies to Oliver Cromwell's starvation of the Irish 'a barefaced lie' and an 'ideologically motivated rant.'
- Cammock defended the piece as a creative work, not a documentary, saying it is meant to spark 'dialogue' about 'who is honoured and valorised and who is not' in the gallery's collection.
- The Telegraph also criticized the work, calling Cammock's assertion that Churchill caused the famine 'incorrect' and attributing the crisis to natural disasters, local mismanagement and wartime supply problems.
- The 1943 Bengal famine killed an estimated 3 million people in eastern India, and some academics argue Churchill ignored rice shortage warnings and ordered food stockpiling for the army ahead of a Japanese invasion, worsening the crisis; defenders say Churchill was unaware and acted once informed.
- The National Portrait Gallery said it received the letter and will respond, noted it was unaware of any visitor complaints, and stated it 'supports freedom of artistic expression while not necessarily endorsing the opinions expressed' by artists it shows.
- Artists speaking anonymously to the Guardian called the row a politically motivated 'attempt to silence artists and institutions,' with Cammock described as the latest Black British artist targeted by the rightwing press.
Why it matters: The NPG has explicitly defended 'freedom of artistic expression' while 50+ peers demand accountability, putting the publicly funded gallery in the middle of a pressure campaign. Cammock's reframing of the work as creative rather than documentary shifts the dispute from factual accuracy to artistic intent — a distinction that may not satisfy critics but gives the institution cover to keep the piece on display through August.
