Helen Bradley
Helen Layfield Bradley was born in Lees on 20 November 1900. The family lived at 58 High Street. Although her painting career took off late in life, Helen went on to become a successful artist with an international reputation.
Helen was home schooled for several years, and spent a lot of time with her family, which was later to form the basis of her paintings, in particular spending time with her Grandmother and aunts, as well as her friends.
Helen got an art scholarship at age 12 to attend Oldham Art School. However her father insisted on her doing “girl’s sort of things” – jewellery, needlework and stained glass.
She was taken out of school by her father a year early, and at the start of The Great War, she went to work with her father delivering parcels for the family business.
Married life
Helen married painter and textile designer Thomas Bradley, and she spent the next 40 years as a wife and mother. While she didn’t take up painting until retirement age, she kept a keen interest in art, visiting galleries including the British Museum where she discovered a love for Persian miniatures.
A second life
Helen began painting again in her 60s. She had her first exhibition – a one woman show at the Saddleworth Art Society – in 1965. Thsi was followed by exhibitions in London in 1966 and in Los Angeles in 1968.
Her initial work recounted her time growing up in Lees and Springhead. The first book of her work “And Miss Carter Wore Pink” recounts images from her childhood, when her grandmother would collect her in the afternoon, along with her three maiden aunts, and family friend Miss Carter.
Later works took on a more fantastical tone based on biblical stories which were told to her in her childhood about when God moved to Springhead. Paintings showing the area include “Sometimes on Saturday Mornings” a street scene from High Street, Lees, and “Mother, George and I go to David Bromley’s garden” which shows some of the local mills in the background.
Her witty, simple style was much admired, and she quickly became famous, with appearances on Desert Island Discs and an NBC documentary. She was awarded an MBE in 1979, but died shortly before the investiture.
Although Helen had moved to Wilmslow, she remained close to her roots. She donated a painting to Lees Old People’s Welfare Committee, which raised £1,000 at auction, and two prints of Daisy Nook to support the campaign against the M66 motorway.
Local sites
58 High Street, her childhood home, is in the centre of Lees, next to LA Florists.
The blue plaque to commemorate her birth is at the rear of the property, at 3 Princess Street, Lees.
The School of Art, where Bradley studied, was located on Union Street in Oldham, next to the Lyceum.
More local sites included in her paintings include several in the collections of Gallery Oldham. Fire on Union Street captures Helen’s memories of a mill fire near to the town centre while A Special Treat features miners coming off shift at Chamber Hill colliery.
Find out more
The full list of works by Helen Bradley held in public collections, including Gallery Oldham and Saddleworth Museum, is available on the ArtUK website
You can hear Helen Bradley’s interview on Desert Island Discs on the BBC website
Further information including Helen Bradley’s obituary is available on the Oldham Historical Research website