The passage of time moves at an ever growing pace – whilst it’s essential to move forward, we can often forget where we came from and how things were for each generation living in our towns and communities. It’s important to look back and understand the power of documentary photography in preserving the changing times that we have lived through.
Community
Nick Wynne’s photographs of Liverpool and Merseyside in the 1980s depict a time when we were less distracted and polarised by the constant overload of news and media. There is something special about Nick’s images; you can see his genuine connection with his subject.
Photo © Nick Wynne.
Like Rob Bremner, who was a fellow student of Wallasey and Newport, Nick’s images capture the raw energy and reality of everyday life growing up on Merseyside during the Thatcher years.
“Tom Wood was a massive influence on me. He took me into the library and showed me the works of Gary Winogrand, Lee Friedlander and Diane Arbus. He talked about the photos and why they worked.”
Photo © Nick Wynne.
Tom Wood
Nick, “I first became interested in photography while I was at school in the early ’80s. I left school without any qualifications, so I initially did a foundation course in art before going on to the photography course at Wallasey. At Wallasey, I was taught by a tutor called Fred Edwards and Tom Wood. Tom Wood was a massive influence on me. He took me into the library and showed me the works of Gary Winogrand, Lee Friedlander and Diane Arbus. He talked about the photos and why they worked. He would also take me around Liverpool while he was taking his photos, shooting from the top deck of the bus and around the markets. I thought it was great how he would just go up to people and take photos. This inspired me, and I started to do this myself. Tom taught me how to read photographs.
During my time at Wallasey, I began a body of work documenting a traveller community in North Wales, as well as everyday life in Liverpool and Merseyside.”
Photo © Nick Wynne.
Traveller Community
“One of my first projects at college was to document the landscapes nearby. As I was taking photographs in Shotton, North Wales by the Steelworks, a large community of travellers arrived on the site.
The camp was split into two really, the Irish travellers and the New Age travellers. They two groups were travelling together so all got on with each other. When they first got there the young Irish kids were throwing stones at me. Ben in the above photo was a little lad who clung on to me, I was 17 when I took these photos. All the travellers got to know me well, I gained their trust by smoking cannabis with them… once they knew I wasn’t police or undercover they were fine with me taking their photos.”
“After Wallasey, I continued my studies at Wolverhampton Poly under Nick Hedges and finally, in the early 90s, I went to Newport, which was then headed up by Daniel Meadows.”
Power of The Image
“In recent years, I have been working on self-funded projects, both in Beirut and nearer to home, reflecting my own awareness and vulnerabilities in the wider communities in which I find myself. I’m attempting to balance the desire to capture the changing times we live in, while at the same time, ironically facing the increasing dilemma of other people’s awareness about the power of the image, the perception others may have of the creator, or the reasons for creating those images.”
Gallery
Photo © Nick Wynne.
Photo © Nick Wynne.
Photo © Nick Wynne.
Photo © Nick Wynne.
Photo © Nick Wynne.
Photo © Nick Wynne.
Photo © Nick Wynne.
All images © Nick Wynne, all rights reserved. No usage or reproduction of any kind without prior permission of the copyright holder.
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- Article first published
- October 12, 2021
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