The Women's Art Collection

31/05/2026

13/04/2026

New event! Women Artists’ Life Writing in Fiction and Biography 📖

19 June, 6.30-8pm, Buckingham House Lecture Theatre, Murray Edwards College
 
Join writers Harriet Baker, Rebecca Birrell, and Alicia Foster for a discussion of how women artists’ life writing has been used in their work, encompassing fiction, non-fiction and biography. Moderated by Linda Goddard.
 
This event will take place in the evening after ‘In Her Words: Women Artists and Life Writing Symposium’. Please book your tickets to both events separately.

17/03/2026

Now open! 📣

We’re delighted that Relative Ties is now open to the public! Relative Ties celebrates over a century of artistic innovation and inheritance, tracing the work of four women from the celebrated Nicholson family — Mabel Nicholson, Nancy Nicholson, EQ Nicholson and Louisa Creed. Accompanying the work of this family is a new commission by contemporary artist Katie Schwab, whose work explores the relationships between generations of women and their shared creative approaches.

Open daily, free, no booking required. Exhibition is on until 6 September at 🌟

11/03/2026

Monday night marked the annual Monday Muse Celebratory Dinner from The Wick, championing some of the best and brightest women of today’s cultural industry, hosted in partnership with The Chancery Rosewood. Our Director Harriet Loffler had the pleasure of attending this wonderful evening.

Centred around the theme “Constellation” the evening celebrated the bonds and networks which are vital culture and art to thrive.

The Wick is on a mission to Connect the Culturally Curious and “Monday Muse” is a weekly feature created by The Wick celebrating and platforming women who have created cultural impact and legacy with their work and in their expertise and creativity covering the visual arts, design, and interdisciplinary creative industry sectors. Last night was a moment to champion this community and culture’s power to bring people together.

In celebration of this theme and International Women’s Week, the evening was hosted in the latest addition to The Chancery Rosewood, Japanese restaurant Tobi Masa, founded by the renowned sushi chef, Masayoshi Takayama.

The Chancery Rosewood’s remarkable 850-strong art collection reflects a deep dialogue between art and hospitality, the past and the present, bringing together paintings, photography, tapestry and sculpture from both sides of the Atlantic, reflecting a deep history of cultural exchange. It was amongst these works that poet Sophia Thakur gave a spellbinding performance, tying the evening together in the spirit of culture and community.


📸

03/03/2026

The women in our upcoming exhibition ‘Relative Ties’ that opens this week on Friday 6 March! 📷

In the first photo is artist Louisa Creed, followed by her mother EQ Nicholson, EQ’s sister-in-law Nancy Nicholson, and Nancy’s mother, Mabel Nicholson 🧵

We can’t wait to share this exhibition with you! Visit us between 10am–5pm any day of the week for free 🖼️

02/03/2026

New acquisition: ‘Enmeshed’ (2023) by Debbie Yeboah .debbie.yeboah 🌿

This piece engages the artist’s concepts of “braiding as re-membering” and “renaturation”, theoretical concepts she developed during her PhD at Cambridge and continues to explore.

These concepts consider the reconstitution and reimagining of the African self in the wake of coloniality. It considers the potential for healing from the tangible, embodied, and violence of coloniality on the Ghanaian body, knowledge, and identity. The play on “remembering” is a counter to the device of colonial amnesia, a forgetting of the damage caused on culture and self.

For this work, Yeboah employed acrylic painting, scanning, digital iterations of collaging, layering and the imagery of the braid, overlaid on the figure in a double negative. The background foliage shown is from the gardens around the artist’s home in Accra Ghana, and crowns the figure with palm leaves. The motif of the braid, shown on the face and shoulder is a reminder of everyday Ghanaian artistry, as well as the intimate communal connections that create it.

This piece formed part of the work presented in Yeboah’s first solo show, ‘Renaturation: Fractured Identities, Future Selves’ at The Women’s Art Collection in 2024.

Come and see this work in the Art Cafe at 🖼️

Acquired with the support of Katy Anusha Wickremesinghe, Sigrid Kirk, Lucy-Anne Garnett and Rachel Polonsky.

25/02/2026

Now on display: ‘May’ by Julia Ball (1930–2025) 🌞

Julia Ball was a British abstract painter known for her intuitive use of colour and subtle exploration of spatial relationships. Throughout her career, Ball explored the expressive potential of colour through painterly, large-scale canvases that blur the boundaries between landscape and abstraction.

In 1974, Ball was one of the founding members of Cambridge Open Studios, an annual event where artists across the city welcome members of the public into their studios.

‘May’ was inspired by time the artist spent in Quy Fen, a large, protected area of common land near Cambridge which is now maintained by a small group of local residents.

Beyond her art making, Ball was a committed socialist and feminist, active in causes from the miners’ strike to the Greenham Common peace camp. Her paintings are held in collections across Cambridge, including Churchill and Lucy Cavendish Colleges and an exhibition of her work took place at Murray Edwards College in 1995.

🖼️ Julia Ball, ‘May’, 1990, oil on board, 153 × 122 cm. Donated by the artist in 2012.

WomensArtCollection

20/02/2026

Final weekend to see ‘The Sleepers’ before it closes on at 6pm on Sunday 22 February 🌛

Free, no need to book, open daily 10am–6pm.

Photos by

18/02/2026

Today we were honoured to welcome the incredible artist Helen Cammock to The Women’s Art Collection! ✨

Their works ‘Can you remember when you last did nothing?’ and ‘When you last did nothing Can you remember how it felt?’ (2020) are on display in our exhibition ‘The Sleepers’ until the end of this week.

Make sure to come down between 10am–6pm any day this week to catch it before it closes! 💤

09/02/2026

Murray Edwards College announces new leadership of The Women’s Art Collection 🖼️
 
Murray Edwards College, University of Cambridge, is delighted to announce a new leadership structure for The Women’s Art Collection to enhance its national and international profile, sustainability, and long-term impact.
 
Harriet Loffler, Curator since 2018, is now Director of The Women’s Art Collection. She will focus on strategic curatorial development, profile raising and fundraising to align the Collection with the College’s wider philanthropic priorities.
 
Laura Moseley, Assistant Curator since 2024, has been promoted to Curator. This redefined role is tailored to support an early-career curator and focuses on the care, conservation, and visibility of the Collection, while delivering ambitious exhibitions, programming, and outreach.
 
Sarah Greaves, who has played a crucial role in the maintenance and growth of the Collection since 2004, is now Keeper. She will provide strategic and operational oversight, ensuring strong governance, institutional integrity, and continuity of vision.
 
The Women’s Art Collection is a nationally significant resource for teaching, research, and wider public engagement. By strengthening its leadership and embedding the Collection more closely within its strategic and fundraising frameworks, Murray Edwards College is investing confidently in the future of the Women’s Art Collection and its mission to champion women artists to the widest possible audience.

We are delighted to be entering this new chapter! Sign up to our mailing list to hear about our upcoming exhibitions, events and news. 📰

Photography by Dasha Tenditna