The noticeboard installation showed at ROOM ARTSPACE, Islington, London May – June 2023

small ads/classifieds/personals – the go-to place to get help whether you need money, a home, a plumber or a baby daddy . .

This is one of the sources for my study of public noticeboards. Anthropological treasures, they offer a commentary about a particular neighbourhood and about our society in general: They describe loneliness and need. They show us who is vulnerable and where social power lies.

The notices themselves are short stories – often poignant, sometimes funny and occasionally disturbing. The materiality of each physical notice creates a sort of portrait of the person behind it, the materials used, the syntax, spelling mistakes, changes and updates, handwriting, the idiosyncratic use of a typewriter all add to the richness of the stories.

These marketplaces are a disappearing phenomenon, the internet is partly responsible for this but it is also clear that gentrification has tidied away this unruly mess of paper, card and Blu-Tac

My artwork – textile facsimiles of shop window notices – can be seen at

sandie macrae -postROOM – 41 Ecclesbourne Road, N1 3AF until 17th June.

I saw this notice in Putney, it’s fairly common to see these requests for women to provide unspecified help offering ‘good financial support’ – not an actual wage then…

It used to be very common to see shop window notices seeking ‘relationships’ – the woman’s role in the bargain is to provide housework, emotional support and presumably sex work in return for somewhere to sleep.

My collection of noteworthy small ads and classifieds goes back decades. I’ve been recreating some examples photographed in shop windows around the UK

From a series of collaborations exploring ideas of identity;  how we are perceived, how we perceive ourselves and how we might confuse or subvert expectations . This image was made with costume designer Pam Tait  in response to the idea that with ageing we are expected to become invisible. Earlier posts show further collaborations

from the hide/disguise series work-in-progress

Part of the  ‘camouflage’ series of images which addresses how we present ourselves and how we negotiate the idea that we must somehow ‘fit in’ but also ‘stand out’  from the crowd.

Continuing the “camouflage” series, these images were created with artist  Rosa Eaton