The Second Shift

by Clare Gallagher

‘“The Second Shift is the term given to the hidden shift of housework and childcare primarily carried out by women on top of their paid employment,” writes Irish artist Clare Gallagher in her short introduction to a beautifully designed book of deftly observed images. They evoke the quotidian work rituals of home and family, and her own anger at what is taken for granted. For all that, Gallagher is a quiet photographer, a creator of intimately observed details that can often approach the dreamlike: unwashed laundry overflowing from a basket, a tangle of electrical wires emanating from an extension socket, vegetable peelings, eggshells, food residue soaking in an oven dish. Her images illuminate a domestic grind so familiar and habitual that it all but goes unseen.’

64 pages, Hardcover

Published January 1, 2019