Spirit of the Times: Photographing the 80s

As part of the ongoing 'Photographing the 80s' exhibition at Tate Britain I was invited to give a talk about my work at The Clore Auditorium, part of the main gallery.

I wanted to explore the work that I am showing in a more comprehensive and accessible way, and to explore themes of love, identity, time and solidarity that is reflected in the images.

I also wanted to bring back some of the experiences that I had whilst making the work especially the music that I heard in some of the churches that are part of the series that I am exhibiting.

In order to facilitate this accessibility, I asked Denise Pitter a singer from London to accompany my talk. The series of lectures from each participant was about ‘reflection’ and ‘remembering’ the 1980’s, so the songs that me and Denise chose were:
‘This Little Lights of Mine’ to reference the light and also joy in some of the images
‘Old Time Religion’ as a specific spiritual reference
‘Going to the Chapel’ to reference a local community church wedding photograph

To finish at the end of the talk, ‘Stand By Me’ whilst the audience looked back through the images as reference to the themes of community and solidarity that I was exploring through my talk.

The songs were sung at particular points to specific images. Denise also hummed a self-penned melody at specific points of the talk when I was referencing specific writers or themes that had an emotional resonance.

from the Tate website:
'Hear readings, rememberings and reflections from artists Grace Lau, Jem Southam, mitra tabrizian, Rosy Martin and Roy Mehta

Join us for a panel discussion with artists and photographers in the context of the exhibition The 80s: Photographing Britain. In this critical decade, photography was used as a tool for social change, political activism, and artistic and photographic experiments.

The artists will share their distinct approaches to photographic practice. They will reflect on the cultural memory of the 1980s and the legacies of those years on contemporary photographic practice and our wider culture.'
above text sourced from https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-britain/spirit-of-the-times

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