You have previously shown a smaller collection of similar works at the Imagine! Festival for Ideas and politics in March. What makes this exhibition different, or is it simply a further exploration of the subject to a wider audience?
The response from the works shown at Imagine! was so positive. It seemed like a good idea to take the theme forward. Thanks go to Eva Grossman at the Centre for Democracy and Peace Building and Keith Acheson at the Crescent Arts Centre for their support.
I’ve really asked the people I’m photographing to think of items that represent them and their journeys that might not be as literal as simply a family photograph or a piece of jewellery. The main thing I wanted to carry through from the previous exhibit to this one and any further explorations of this theme is the idea that purity is disillusioned. We are all mongrels, we’re all nomads wh have arrived here from around the world. We’re all ‘immigrants’ of some sort or another. I want to break it down and strip back the constructs that we’ve put up around these issues in a benign way.
What I think is really important and what I’m trying my best to do with this exhibit is to ask the viewer to question not only the journeys of the subjects, but also their own journeys. It’s become so common to hold these negative opinions of immigration, but there are so many reasons for it – love, work, family, ambition. We really are more than capable of dealing with the influx of immigrants here and especially in Northern Ireland, we’re used to thse damaging polarised opinions. We’re no strangers to separation.
Do you ever find it hard to deal with the stories of your subject, or does th fact the subjects are so comfortable with exposing their stories to you help drive your work forward?
I’m not often exposing many tales of heartbreak or trauma. Whilst I am very much hearing more than you’re actually seeing in the works, I’m not pushing for any really dramatic content from the people I photography. This (exhibit) isn’t about that kind of blatant media sympathy that almost distracts from the fact that these are real people. I don’t want to stage a scene in which the viewer walks away full of pity, feeling detached from the subject. Rather, I want to guide people with the subject matter. It’s collaboration between me and the subjects.
The angle I take the photographs from means there is a level of trust and intimacy between myself, the camera and the person, and therefore that intimacy and trust is passed on to the viewer. Every collaboration is approached with an open view to see what happens and where it takes us. I spent about an hour to an hour and a half with each person. Most of that time is spent talking. I’m only supplementing the images with location, but there’s a lot unsaid in the images that I invite the audience or the viewer to explore.
Do you feel a responsibility to bring these sorts of stories to an audience that would otherwise only be exposed to this issue through (an often) right wing media sources?
It’s a such a dense subject matter. It’s something with so much weight and so much obvious conversation around it that it seemed very worthwhile exploring in a much less weighty way. I didn’t want to make props of the subjects by simply sticking them onto a conveyor belt of shots in a photography studio; that would remove all of the familiarity and warmth of the images. I wanted to make sure that the images a) hid the identity of the person and b) felt normal and raw to the viewer. My work has always been about stripping back what I can offer and just making it as transparent and present as possible. I’m not interested in trying to drive big concepts or leave the viewer confused or dumbfounded. Rather, I just want to get their brains ticking and perhaps engage them in something they may not necessarily already have been engaged with. The whole message I want the viewer to take away from the works s one of inclusion, understanding, and to make it clear that diversity is what makes u human. It’s what we thrive on, it’s where every single strain of every single culture derives form, and without it we would be people living in very deprived, dry and bland society. (Im)migration happens; accept it, embrace it, because it isn’t going anywhere.
By Gemma McSherry. John Baucher photo by Michael Barbour. Exhibition photos courtesy of John Baucher.
Originally published by CultureHUB, November 2016.