100 Mothers was an art exhibition curated by Harry Pye

Harry Pye

Harry Pye is an artist, writer and event organiser. He was born in London in 1973. He completed a foundation course at Camberwell School of Art in 1991. He then studied printmaking at Winchester School of Art from 1992 to 1995. In his second year he stopped painting and printmaking and began...

 that originally took place at the "Oh Art" Gallery at The Oxford House, Bethnal Green

Bethnal Green

Bethnal Green is a district of the East End of London, England and part of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, with the far northern parts falling within the London Borough of Hackney. Located northeast of Charing Cross, it was historically an agrarian hamlet in the ancient parish of Stepney,...

 in March 2004. Pye put the show together with help from several artist friends including Elizabeth Haarala, Mat Humphrey, Jasper Joffe

Jasper Joffe

Jasper Joffe is a British contemporary artist and novelist.-Life and work:Jasper Joffe was born in the United States in 1975 and moved to England when he was eight. He is the brother of artist Chantal Joffe. He studied Fine Art at the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art, Oxford...

 and Emma Ridgway.

Pye's aim was to stage the most straightforward and irony-free exhibition possible in time for Mother's Day

Mother's Day

Mother's Day is a celebration honoring mothers and celebrating motherhood, maternal bonds, and the influence of mothers in society. It is celebrated on various days in many parts of the world, yet most commonly in March, April, or May...

. His friends supplied fifty male and fifty female artists with the same size canvas and asked them to make a painting based on their mother.
Amongst those who took part in the original show were Dinos Chapman, Vic Reeves

Vic Reeves

James Roderick Moir , better known by the stage name Vic Reeves, is an English comedian, best known for his double act with Bob Mortimer . He is known for his surreal and non sequitur sense of humour....

, Grayson Perry

Grayson Perry

Grayson Perry is an English artist, known mainly for his ceramic vases and cross-dressing. Perry's vases have classical forms and are decorated in bright colours, depicting subjects at odds with their attractive appearance. There is a strong autobiographical element in his work, in which images of...

, Richard Wathen

Richard Wathen

Richard Llewelyn Wathen is a British painter born in 1971. He lives in Norfolk in England. Wathen graduated with a BA in Fine Art Painting from Winchester School of Art in 1995 and received an MA in Fine Art from the Chelsea School of Art in 1996.-Style:...

, Neil Innes

Neil Innes

Neil James Innes is an English writer and performer of comic songs, best known for his collaborative work with Monty Python, and for playing in the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band and later The Rutles.-Personal life:...

, Bob & Roberta Smith, Billy Childish

Billy Childish

Billy Childish is an English artist, painter, author, poet, photographer, film maker, singer and guitarist...

 and Liz Neal

Liz Neal

Liz Neal is an artist based in London.Neal grew up in North Wales. She makes paintings and installations which reference sexual, consumer and fantasy imagery. From 2001-2003, Neal turned the front room of her North London flat into an installation by covering every surface of the space with...

.

Three artists featured in the show (Daisy de Villeneuve, Geraldine Swayne

Geraldine Swayne

Geraldine Swayne is a London-based painter, musician, and filmmaker.She studied Fine Art at Newcastle University, graduating in 1989. She won a Northern Arts Travel award in 1990 to paint and make super-8 films about Voodoo in New Orleans and later moved to Languedoc in France...

, and Sarah Sparkes) were interviewed about their contributions on the BBC

BBC

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 Radio Four show Woman's Hour

Woman's Hour

Woman's Hour is a radio magazine programme broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in the United Kingdom.-History:Created by Norman Collins and originally presented by Alan Ivimey the programme was first broadcast on 7 October 1946 on the BBC's Light Programme . It was transferred to its current home in 1973...

Several other artists including Mat Humphrey, Peter Harris and Rowland Smith were interviewed about their paintings and their mothers by Don't Panic magazine: http://www.dontpaniconline.com/magazine/family/your-mum
A brochure designed by Elizabeth Haarala and Keith Sargent was sold at the show, featuring an introduction written by poet Benjamin Zephaniah

Benjamin Zephaniah

Benjamin Obadiah Iqbal Zephaniah is an English writer and dub poet. He is a well-known figure in contemporary English literature, and was included in The Times list of Britain's top 50 post-war writers in 2008....

, with contributions from John Hegley

John Hegley

John Richard Hegley is an English performance poet, comedian, musician and songwriter.-Early life:He was born in the Newington Green area of Islington, London, England, into a Roman Catholic household. He was brought up in Luton and Bristol...

 and Jock Scot.

The exhibition toured to the North Edinburgh Art Centre in Scotland

Scotland

Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

. In March 2008 the exhibition took place again, this time at the Sartorial Contemporary Art gallery