Lise Meitner

Location

Country: UK
City: London
Place: Cabinet Office, 70 Whitehall

Yelena Popova’s (born 1978) upholstered chair, Lise Meitner, takes its title from the Austrian-Swedish physicist of the same name.

About Lise Meitner

Born in Vienna in 1878, Meitner moved to Berlin to pursue a scientific career. In 1926, she became the first woman in Germany to achieve the grade of Professor of Physics. Alongside fellow physicist Otto Hahn, she led the small research group that discovered the nuclear fission of uranium, arguably the most influential scientific breakthrough of the 20th century. This discovery gave rise to the twin pursuits of nuclear energy and nuclear weapons. In 1938, the passing of the Nuremberg Laws in Germany meant that Meitner, who had converted to Christianity in 1908 but was born into a Jewish family, found herself unemployed and under threat. She fled to the Netherlands, and later settled in Sweden. When Meitner was invited to be part of the Manhattan Project, the joint effort led by the United States and Canada that resulted in the first nuclear weapons, she declared ‘I will have nothing to do with the bomb!’

About this artwork

The chair used for this work was retrieved by the artist from Girton College, Cambridge. It is upholstered with a jacquard woven tapestry based on Yelena Popova’s first tapestry, For Mind, Body and Spirit (2017) produced during the year of the artist's residency at Girton College in 2016–17. With its multiple rays and waves emanating from two central circles, the imagery of the upholstery brings to mind scientific diagrams of chemical elements.

Yelena Popova (b. 1978, Urals, Russia) lives and works in Nottingham. She studied at Moscow Art Theatre School and Byam Shaw at Central St Martins before graduating from MA Painting at the Royal College of Art in July 2011. She has exhibited internationally since 2011, and has won several prizes including The Outset Prize (2011), The Parallel Prize (2011), The Red Mansion Prize (2011), in addition to being shortlisted for The Arts Foundation Awards: Painting (2013).

Places

Subjects

science, physics, woman

Materials & Techniques

wood, textile, tapestry, mixed media sculpture, chair

Artist

Yelena Popova (1978 - )

Title

Lise Meitner

Date

2018

Medium

Unique re-upholstered chair

Dimensions

height: 86.7 cm, width: 76.0 cm, depth: 81.0 cm

Acquisition

Purchased from L'étrangère, January 2019

Provenance

L'étrangère, London, UK; from whom purchased by the UK Government Art Collection, 2019

GAC number

18783