In 2010, Helen Wilson Roe was given the opportunity to research the history of Butetown, one of Cardiff's oldest and most diverse dockside communities. The resulting 15-month residency, funded by the Arts Council of Wales, gave her something few commissions allow: proper time to research a place before painting it.
The residency opened with a retrospective of her existing work and closed with something new — a body of oil paintings built around the local heroes of Butetown itself, turning a community rarely given gallery space into the subject of one.
