Trent Polytechnic
Flat visitor 1980
Unused image from the flat 8 project
1980
From the flat 8 project. In my mind I had it that the 4 art students I shared with ate together and shared a cooking rota, perhaps true some of the time but not generally. Being back in touch means memories can be compared and they dont always align with the stories we tell.
Pentax K1000, 50mm f2 lens Ilford HP5 film.
Keith Piper. Artist. 1980
Keith Piper, on the site of abandoned houses about to be demolished in Hamden Street, Nottingham. 1980.
Keith was a fellow flatmate at the student accomodation just down the street from here. I had asked Keith if I could take his portrait as I had the loan of an old MPP 5×4 view camera and wanted to try to do a portrait with it. Rather than the clinical look of a studio I thought it would be good to have a more interesting background.
It was inevitable perhaps that putting up my old images from the past would help me reconnect with people. My first ever photo course project was to photograph “where we lived”. This is probably the Polytechnic version of “What I did in my holidays” as it kept us out of our tutors hair whilst they got ready for the new year. The result was the flat 8 project.
The project has become more valuable with time, the appreciation of the guys I shared the flat with and then recently finding out what happened to them as they reveal themselves 44 years later. It turns out that Keith was a founder member of the BLK art group (whilst still on the course) and he used his energies and passion for tackling social and political issues through his art. He was and is a key figure in the development of the black art movement in the UK.
His entry in Wikipedia is here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Piper_(artist) and his website is here: https://www.keithpiper.info/.
The art students in my first year accomodation at Trent were good company. They tended to be a year older as I had come straight from school and they had come from an intermediary local foundation art course. They were confident and more worldy wise than I was and introduced me to new ideas and music.
Disco at the Arbouretum pub in Nottingham 1982/3
The Arboretum in 1980 was a pub for older people, there was live music from singers in the style of Frank Sinatra and others of that period.
Within a short time it was refitted for the younger crowd. Dress code to get in: no trainers, smart attire.
The atmosphere was intense. Groups of girls, groups of boys. Overcoming the friction with music and alcohol.
Sawley, Derbyshire
Cows gather for milking on a farm next to All Saints Church, Yashica 124G 1981/82. Field trip for Trent Polytechnic photo students.
Living history
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I photographed the prospectus for Newark Colledge in I think 1981 / 1982 as part of my photo course. I visited each department in turn but I remember best the visit to the violin making department.
The students were from all over the world and I remember the calm but focused atmosphere. It turns out that the people I photographed then have gone on to be significant figures in their field.
Hans Johannsson had left a year or two earlier but I was asked by Brian FitzGibbon the director of a short documentary if I would supply some images taken in the early 80s, I was happy to do so. Its well woth a watch as the director has made a sensitive and well rounded overview of Hans’s journey.
I love the fact that Hans whilst respecting the past thinks above and beyond what has been to what could be and is still prepared to experiment.
A student of art 1980
Bernard in the kitchen at the first year student accomodation in Bayham street. I took the religious iconography as ironic but now I wonder.