There’s a brief reply from Martin Parr on the Flickr group in response to a comment about his Newcastle photographs, which I’ve copied out here-
As a relatively recent resident of Newcastle (I grew up in Sussex, moved from London 5 years ago) I was appalled by the supplement on the city in this Saturday’s Gaurdian.
It is the most biased piece of misrepresentation of a city I have ever perused…
The photos are beautiful – no doubting that – but as an overview of a city (which this purports to be) it misses out more than 1/2 of the population, instead concentrating solely on the working class.
It lends one to think that the photographer had an agenda – and even in his opening spiel goes on about how “industry has not been replaced” and implies that the city is depressed… It almost begs the question, did he really come here?
Examples:
pic of tattooed man bbqing on Cullercoats beach – what about the yummy mummys and their bugaboos who I saw there every sunny day last summer?
pic of woman at Races, fag in hand, bottle of Echo Falls – did he search for these people?? – what about the boxes full of business people and solicitors, drinking premium champagne who gave up smoking, if they ever did smoke, when the ark docked…
and so moving on from dance halls and bingo to the rest of the population… what about a pic of the boys outside the Royal Grammer School; a glance at the >£1m houses in Gosforth or Jesmond, and their residents; something from the vibrant arts scene, both on the Newcastle and Gateshead sides of the river – the regeneration and money that’s gone into the Baltic, and the Sage is enormous, and the largest selling art gallery in Britain (the Biscuit Factory) has had pieces by Damien Hirst for sale and sold; it’s hard to get tickets for music of any kind, at the Metro Arena, the Carling Academy, or the Sage, it all sells out – but we’re all poverty struck??
It was my impression that you could have taken the photos in this supplement in Manchester, London, Southampton, Birmingham, Glasgow, (well, apart from the seaside one!) basically anywhere, so what impression of Newcastle does this give?
parrpolygon (aka Martin Parr) says:
“It is great that my photos can wind up the likes of Caroline so much. I had no agenda apart from looking round, finding photo genic situations and I believe that I am entitled to shoot what i like. I do not think the Newcstle supplement is down on Newcastle. In her list of what I photograph, she very conveniently misses out the more middle class subject matter, perhaps she had an agenda?”
Posted in MISCELLANEOUS | 1 Comment »
I must say that I’ve been totally underwhelmed by Martin Parr’s much heralded photographic portrayal of ten British cities, which have been running as ‘special’ supplements in the Guardian newspaper over the past few months.
This weekend, the Guardian’s Weekend magazine ran a cover story with a twelve page spread showing a selection of Parr’s photographs under the title ‘Urban Splash- Martin Parr captures the essence of Britain’s cities’.
I’ve not seen the full set of photographs, however, if the magazine’s edit is anything to go by then they appear to be little more than an incoherent selection of snapshots hurridely collated, and furnished with uninteresting and often irrelevant captions. Aesthetically they seem very lazy indeed. Maybe he’s been too busy this year peddling Parrworld? (the largest exhibition to date of his work, which opened at the Haus der Kunst in Munich and is touring the world).
The whole project also appears to be very calculating in terms of its spin-offs, with various box sets (standard and deluxe) and calendars available from the Guardian website here.
I’m not one of those anti-Parr photographers, indeed I’ve long respected him as a practitioner and commentator, however it does seem that he’s missed a real opportunity to produce something interesting and illuminating about Britain, twenty years after the publication of his groundbreaking book, The Last Resort.
Much of his portrayal has certainly been seen as very stereotypical, as illustrated by these comments posted on the Guardian letters page –
“I was dismayed and shocked by Martin Parr’s supplement on Newcastle (British cities: Newcastle, October 27). He introduces his piece: “I first visited Newcastle in the mid-70s and I remember being impressed with Byker, a classic working-class suburb with a tight sense of community and steep terraces. I revisited Byker for this project and found the small shops were struggling, despite Aldi and the Gala Bingo doing well.” This shows he came to Newcastle with the notion of finding that quaint, parochial, grim-up-north picture of the Geordie struggle for survival – a dangerous stereotype to uphold.
Newcastle is no longer a bastion of British industrial power, but a multicultural metropolis often billed the London of the north because of the regeneration that has been applied to all areas of the city. Areas such as the Quayside and Jesmond have welcomed this regeneration, and have seen new life breathed into them, attracting young professionals and students alike.
There are many things Parr could have shot to highlight the urban evolution that is happening within this city. He mentions Grey Street and the stunning architecture of the city centre, but does not show it in any of his photographs. Then there are some of the many attractions that bring people to the city that he missed out in favour of outdated sentiments, such as the Laing Art Gallery, the Tyneside cinema, Blackfriars dining hall, the Tynemouth Priory and Castle, the Jazz Cafe, both universities and any one of the many bridges spanning the Tyne – I could go on.”
Nelson Iley, Newcastle upon Tyne
“Martin Parr’s supplement on Newcastle was billed as one of a series “capturing today’s urban Britain”. What he has actually done is lazily capture all the cliches of Newcastle from 30 years ago. In his 29 photographs, he manages to pack in bingo, greyhound racing, homing pigeons, a double dose of the derelict Swan Hunter shipyard, a greasy spoon cafe, two shots of hen nights, two lots of women with cheap drinks at the races, and a tattooed man prodding his barbecue. While all of the above go to make up some of the rich mixture of life in Newcastle, where are the other sides to the city? Where’s the chic city centre pubs and bars? Where are the 50,000 students? Where are the arts venues? Where is the growing multicultural community? Guess they would not suit the stereotypes Parr set out to portray.”
Graeme King, Newcastle upon Tyne
“Martin Parr seems to have arrived in Newcastle with all his stereotypes in tow, and to have regurgitated them for us with stock images of pigeon fanciers etc. Geographically, the photo essay was inaccurate. It was entitled Newcastle, but included Gateshead and North Tyneside – two areas distinct from Newcastle in the eyes of north easterners.”
Alison Grant and Anna Vaernes, Newcastle upon Tyne
You can see a selection of Parr’s images from the project on the Guardian’s website here.
I’d be interested to hear your comments on the work, if you haven’t already done so on the Flickr group Martin Parr We Love You!
Posted in OTHER STUDIES, REPRESENTATION | 19 Comments »
Quite belatedly, I’m reading Susan Sontag’s book On Photography (Penguin Books, 1971).
Just read this paragraph, which seems somewhat relevant to my last post….
“One situation where people are switching from bullets to film is the photographic safari that is replacing the gun safari in East Africa. The hunters have Hasselblads instead of Winchesters; instead of looking through a telescopic sight to aim a rifle, they look through a viewfinder to frame a picture….The photographer is now charging real beasts, beleaguered and too rare to kill. Guns have metamorphosed into cameras in this earnest comedy, the ecology safari, because nature has ceased to be what it always had been – what people needed protection from. Now nature – tamed, endangered, mortal – needs to be protected from people. When we are afraid, we shoot. But when we are nostalgic, we take pictures.â€
Posted in RESEARCH | 1 Comment »
says: