It’s interesting that a gallery promoting itself as “the contemporary art museum for South East England” is staging a temporary exhibition about British folklore, a series of festivals, ceremonies and customs often rooted in ancient times.
But this is folklore seen through the lens of photographers and film-makers, many of whom are still working today.
And although the exhibition begins with a photographer who was active in the 19th century, it is brought right up-to-date at the end of the show with those who use the online photo-sharing site Flickr to document folk traditions.
The premise of the exhibition is that folklore is a still vibrant element of Britishness and a living culture that links the past to the present, helping us to understand our communities. Photography is a useful way of analysing this because it captures the ephemeral moments that are at the heart of folk activity.
This is important because many of the material representations of folk events, such as the costumes, degrade quickly and are lost forever. Also, the vast majority of folklore has not been documented in a tangible form by its participants, although it lives on in storytelling and tradition.
Documenting tradition
The exhibition has been curated by the Museum of British Folklore, which has been developing a two-year programme of temporary shows in conjunction with regional art galleries and museums such as the Towner. The aim is to give audiences a taste of what they can expect to see when the museum finds a permanent home.
Collective Observations is broadly chronological, with the first room devoted to Sir Benjamin Stone, who began a meticulous photographic study of folklore traditions in the middle of the 19th century.
In 1897, Stone, a Birmingham industrialist and MP, created the National Photographic Record Association (now held by the V&A) in order to record Britain’s ancient buildings and folk customs.
The comprehensive nature of Stone’s work makes it a remarkable record but the formal nature of many of the images did not bring the folklore tradition alive for me. There were just too many stern men staring earnestly out behind big beards.
But Stone’s work has inspired others, including Homer Sykes, who is among the photographers featured in the second room. Sykes might have been inspired by Stone, but his images owe much to the style of US street photographers such as Garry Winogrand and Lee Friedlander, argues the exhibition.
I really liked his shot of a group of women taking part in Shrove Tuesday Skipping in Scarborough and the three contrasting figures in Caking Night at the Royal Hotel in Dungworth, Sheffield.
The second space, which is rather large for what is on show, also includes colour photographs taken by Doc Rowe, who has been surveying Britain’s changing folk traditions for nearly five decades. Many of his images provide an insight into the sheer excitement of certain UK folk activities.
Nearby Rowe’s work, are black and white images by Brian Shuel, which I found interesting for two reasons. Firstly, while most of the other images in the exhibition are taken in England, Shuel’s include a fair number from Scotland, which does make it feel like a wider exhibition, although there was little to represent Wales and I could see nothing from Northern Ireland.
Shuel is also interesting because he has extended his coverage to take in the newer UK festivals such as Chinese new year and the Notting Hill Carnival. These are, as the exhibition points out, “as much a part of our cultural landscape as older traditions” – more so, I would have thought.
“We English”
One of the obvious advantages of still photography is that it allows you time to really look at images but the third room in the show, featuring a series of films, probably gives visitors a better idea of what many folk events involve – they are often musical, raucous and slightly crazy.
The fourth and final room includes the Flickr photographs and the work of David Ellison, who was born in 1984 and has taken portraits of Cumberland and Westmorland wrestlers. Their costumes are handsewn by their mothers, girlfriends or wives, with each one embroidered to reflect an individual’s particular interests.
The last room also contains books for further reading and a glossary of folk customs that gives details on intriguing events such as the Ceremony of Penny Hedge in Whitby, the Midgley Pace Egg Play in Calder Valley and Widow’s Son Bun Ceremony in London.
I completely agreed with one visitor who wrote in the comments book: “Very interesting but the information on the customs is no use in a folder at the end of the exhibition! Info needs to be displayed alongside the photos to make it meaningful.”
Most of the visitor comments were very positive and one person nicely summed up the exhibition’s appeal: “While we English think of ourselves as normal and staid, we are in fact deeply weird and eccentric.”
It’s noteworthy that the visitor referred to “we English” as this does feel like an exhibition that covers long-established English communities, despite Shuel’s work that broadens it out to include Scotland and communities with roots in the Caribbean and China.
It will be interesting to see how these questions of identity play out in the Museum of British Folklore and how it will turn what is often intangible heritage into a modern museum experience.
Grayson Perry and Jeremy Deller are among the contemporary artists using folklore in their work and our weird and eccentric customs have many depths to explore, as this exhibition makes clear.
But this is folklore seen through the lens of photographers and film-makers, many of whom are still working today.
And although the exhibition begins with a photographer who was active in the 19th century, it is brought right up-to-date at the end of the show with those who use the online photo-sharing site Flickr to document folk traditions.
The premise of the exhibition is that folklore is a still vibrant element of Britishness and a living culture that links the past to the present, helping us to understand our communities. Photography is a useful way of analysing this because it captures the ephemeral moments that are at the heart of folk activity.
This is important because many of the material representations of folk events, such as the costumes, degrade quickly and are lost forever. Also, the vast majority of folklore has not been documented in a tangible form by its participants, although it lives on in storytelling and tradition.
Documenting tradition
The exhibition has been curated by the Museum of British Folklore, which has been developing a two-year programme of temporary shows in conjunction with regional art galleries and museums such as the Towner. The aim is to give audiences a taste of what they can expect to see when the museum finds a permanent home.
Collective Observations is broadly chronological, with the first room devoted to Sir Benjamin Stone, who began a meticulous photographic study of folklore traditions in the middle of the 19th century.
In 1897, Stone, a Birmingham industrialist and MP, created the National Photographic Record Association (now held by the V&A) in order to record Britain’s ancient buildings and folk customs.
The comprehensive nature of Stone’s work makes it a remarkable record but the formal nature of many of the images did not bring the folklore tradition alive for me. There were just too many stern men staring earnestly out behind big beards.
But Stone’s work has inspired others, including Homer Sykes, who is among the photographers featured in the second room. Sykes might have been inspired by Stone, but his images owe much to the style of US street photographers such as Garry Winogrand and Lee Friedlander, argues the exhibition.
I really liked his shot of a group of women taking part in Shrove Tuesday Skipping in Scarborough and the three contrasting figures in Caking Night at the Royal Hotel in Dungworth, Sheffield.
The second space, which is rather large for what is on show, also includes colour photographs taken by Doc Rowe, who has been surveying Britain’s changing folk traditions for nearly five decades. Many of his images provide an insight into the sheer excitement of certain UK folk activities.
Nearby Rowe’s work, are black and white images by Brian Shuel, which I found interesting for two reasons. Firstly, while most of the other images in the exhibition are taken in England, Shuel’s include a fair number from Scotland, which does make it feel like a wider exhibition, although there was little to represent Wales and I could see nothing from Northern Ireland.
Shuel is also interesting because he has extended his coverage to take in the newer UK festivals such as Chinese new year and the Notting Hill Carnival. These are, as the exhibition points out, “as much a part of our cultural landscape as older traditions” – more so, I would have thought.
“We English”
One of the obvious advantages of still photography is that it allows you time to really look at images but the third room in the show, featuring a series of films, probably gives visitors a better idea of what many folk events involve – they are often musical, raucous and slightly crazy.
The fourth and final room includes the Flickr photographs and the work of David Ellison, who was born in 1984 and has taken portraits of Cumberland and Westmorland wrestlers. Their costumes are handsewn by their mothers, girlfriends or wives, with each one embroidered to reflect an individual’s particular interests.
The last room also contains books for further reading and a glossary of folk customs that gives details on intriguing events such as the Ceremony of Penny Hedge in Whitby, the Midgley Pace Egg Play in Calder Valley and Widow’s Son Bun Ceremony in London.
I completely agreed with one visitor who wrote in the comments book: “Very interesting but the information on the customs is no use in a folder at the end of the exhibition! Info needs to be displayed alongside the photos to make it meaningful.”
Most of the visitor comments were very positive and one person nicely summed up the exhibition’s appeal: “While we English think of ourselves as normal and staid, we are in fact deeply weird and eccentric.”
It’s noteworthy that the visitor referred to “we English” as this does feel like an exhibition that covers long-established English communities, despite Shuel’s work that broadens it out to include Scotland and communities with roots in the Caribbean and China.
It will be interesting to see how these questions of identity play out in the Museum of British Folklore and how it will turn what is often intangible heritage into a modern museum experience.
Grayson Perry and Jeremy Deller are among the contemporary artists using folklore in their work and our weird and eccentric customs have many depths to explore, as this exhibition makes clear.
Project data
- Cost £20,000
- Main funders core funding through Eastbourne Borough Council and Arts Council England
- Curators Simon Costin; Mellany Robinson
- Exhibition ends 6 January 2013
