Simon Roberts // PHOTOGRAPHY / We English
Simon Roberts travelled throughout England in a motorhome between 2007 and 2008 for this portfolio of large-format tableaux photographs of the English at leisure. We English builds on his first major body of work, Motherland (2005), with the same themes of identity, memory and belonging resonating throughout. Photographing ordinary people engaged in diverse pastimes, Roberts aims to show a populace with a profound attachment to its local environment and homeland. He explores the notion that nationhood - that what it means to be English – is to be found on the surface of contemporary life, encapsulated by banal pastimes and everyday leisure activities. The resulting images are an intentionally lyrical rendering of a pastoral England, where Roberts finds beauty in the mundane and in the exploration of the relationship between people and place, and of our connections to the landscapes around us.
“The movement that Ray-Jones began and Parr continues is also one in which Simon Roberts is at home. His monumental study We English manages to combine a fascination with social rituals such as St George’s day pageants and visits to the seaside with the type of huge-scale and distant large format ‘grand views’ that appear to come straight out of the American tradition….For Roberts, landscape is a site of leisure pursuits, and this viewpoint fits well with both contemporary social thought and the consumption-obsessed imagery of much current documentary. But he manages somehow to allow the sublime beauty of many of these settings through, and to make pictures of lasting quality.” Peter Hamilton, British Journal of Photography
Book Reviews here: http://dmbmedia.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/We_English_Reviews.pdf
