Since their relocation in February 2019, John Kippin and Nicola Neate have photographed life on North Uist in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland. The work forms IN this DAY and AGE which has recently been displayed in the collection space in Sunderland’s Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art. Photographic prints from the project are also on show in the Island exhibition in the NGCA main gallery.
Below, Joseph Spence caught up with the artists to discuss their project and forthcoming book IN this DAY and AGE published by Kerber Verlag.
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Joseph Spence: Can you tell me about your daily life in Uist and the role you both have had in documenting the island?
John Kippin & Nicola Neate: We never separated our roles out – we worked together on all parts of this project. By doing this, and by working together, taking photographs, writing and planning, we learnt a lot from each other. Daily life was focussed on making work and living.
JS: You both have lived on the island since February 2019. Several world events have taken place such as the coronavirus pandemic and Brexit. How have these events affected island life?
JK&NN: Our project was very ambitious so in some ways the extended time scale, due to the Coronavirus pandemic benefited our project. We were able to become more part of the local community. COVID has increased the ‘Staycations’ to the Outer Hebrides – this is good and bad.
Brexit has had an impact. The island relies on a number of key carriers such as the Post Office and D.R. MacLeod haulage. Some of the continental carriers stopped servicing the Western Isles as their lives had become too much trouble due to the paperwork and charges involved. There is also an impact in terms of what is in the shops, particularly from continental Europe. There are other factors that are affected due to difficulties in travelling to Europe, which was already complicated enough.
JS: I believe this is the first time that you both have worked together on a photographic project. Can you both tell me about the collaboration?
JK&NN: We both took photographs together and separately, we always wrote and planned together – This included portrait and landscape photography, video pieces, and any written outcomes: the blog, conference presentations, talks seminars and workshops, together with the website, magazine articles and social media development. We could not have made this work without the partnership, it worked very well. All work for this project is co-authored.
JS: How did the title IN this DAY and AGE come about?
JK&NN: The title is taken from a crofter’s comment taken from the documentary, anthropological film ‘The Shepherds of Bernerey’. At the end of the film the subject in question says (words to the effect of) Where there is no work (referring to traditional crofting occupations) you cannot live – not ‘in this day and age’. We felt that this was a good starting point for our project.
JS: In the Island exhibition at the Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art there is a collection of photographs from the project. Can you talk a bit about the selection process for that display? You have taken a vast number of photographs whilst living in Uist, I can imagine the selection process being rather challenging.
JK&NN: There were many options available to us and at one stage there was discussion about how many images it would be possible to use within the context of the exhibition ‘Island’.
We had used many different edits for different applications, some were more personal and about our residency in process and work in progress, others were more responsive to (say) the weather or the wildlife. We staged a ‘work in progress’ exhibition at the local Museum and Art Gallery in North Uist. This gave us a feel for the potential of the material and included portraits
alongside environmental landscapes. We arrived at the final 12 images for inclusion in the exhibition ‘Island’ from a long process of editing, focussing our images on the particular narrative structure that we wanted to convey within the specific context of this exhibition. Many more images were included in our Audio-Visual piece, separately on a projected display and including a soundtrack. Yet another selection was chosen to become the legacy images to be included in the book publication.
JS: IN this DAY and AGE will be published by Kerber Verlag later this year. Can you explain how this came into being?
JK&NN: The initial stages of this project were made possible due to funding from the Leverhulme Trust. This is an educational research funding council. The original proposal was to make a body of work building on the work undertaken by Paul Strand in the Outer Hebrides in 1954. This is an iconic work within the history of (modernist) photography. The proposed outcome from the outset, was a book publication, although there was no funding in place to secure this desired outcome at that stage. As the project developed, we were fortunate to work with Alistair Robinson, then the curator at the N.G.C.A. who developed the direction of the project to include the current exhibition and book aspects of the project. Partnership funding by the Arts Council, Sunderland Culture and the Leverhulme Trust made this project happen. We are most grateful to Alistair, and continue to work with him.
JS: What is next? Are you both planning to continue photographing life in Uist?
JK&NN: A project such as this can continue indefinitely, but it was important for us to finish and to resolve the work at this stage. This has coincided with a number of outcomes and deadlines and in order to move on it is important to draw a line under ‘IN this DAY and AGE’. There are always more pictures – more people, more places, more things etc. We are sensitive to that but would wish to develop our work (together and also individually, as appropriate) as new ideas and initiatives emerge.
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Notes:
IN this DAY and AGE was exhibited 7 May – 10 July 2022 in the NGCA Collection Space.
Island continues until 11 September 2022 in the NGCA Main Gallery. For further viewing: NGCA WEBSITE
John Kippin and Nicola Neate’s publication IN this DAY and AGE is published by Kerber Verlag. Their project can also be viewed on their website: IN THIS DAY AND AGE
With thanks to the artists and Joseph Spence for this feature.
