Home of the Photography Workshop

Visual Opinion - Chris Killip at Duckspool

Les McLean

Serious students of photography should attend workshops for, in my view, they generally bring together a group of committed photographers under the leadership of a respected and successful tutor. Rewards in the form of inspiration, direction and ideas to be gained from such a meeting can be a very significant factor in photographic development. When the leader is

Chris Killip, a highly respected photographer in the UK, there is in my case, an extra tingle of anticipation. Therefore, I had to make the long journey to Duckspool in Somerset where Killip, who is having a sabbatical away from teaching, was leading the workshop.

I first became aware of Chris Killip in the late 70s when he was based on Tyneside and involved with the Side Gallery in Newcastle. He went on to produce a body of work called the Seacoalers, photographed on a beach in Northumberland, where, as a boy, I had picked sea coal with my father to keep the family home warm.

Killip's images struck a discordant note with me for I felt that they did not represent the whole truth, therefore I had to see what made this man tick and how he operated in a teaching role.

In 1991, having lived on Tyneside since 1975, Chris moved to America to teach photography at Harvard University in Cambridge near Boston. He has no formal photographic qualifications and has made his way to Harvard via working in various studios as an assistant before moving to Tyneside. Initially, he looked upon photography as a service industry and then, after a visit to the Museum of Modern Art in New York, he realised that photography could exist for its own sake. Consequently, he returned to his home on the Isle of Man where he worked for seven years photographing a body of work which, seven years later, was published as his first book. The reason for the delay was a shortage of high quality book printers, a sign of the man's single mindedness and determination to show his work only on his own terms. 

The Workshop

Chris began the workshop by showing some of his own work and talking about influences and attitudes. Henri Cartier-Bresson is mentioned frequently and has clearly been a major influence, although he has never copied the great man's work. This session was followed by a preliminary look at the work of the 14 photographers attending the workshop. His approach to this can be very disconcerting in that the work is laid out, viewed and put away in a deafening silence, from Chris that is. In mitigation, he does warn students that this is about to happen but it nevertheless can, and does, cause some consternation to the hapless student on the rack.

Having made some preliminary assessment Chris then spends as long as is necessary taking an in depth look at each student's work. He can quickly simplify the direction that it would seem to be best for the work in question to proceed, even though his own thinking and work can be quite complex and contradictory. He spends little time talking about techniques but does point out where it appears to be lacking and suggests to the student that this problem should be addressed. He is very aware that personal work of this nature has to be financed and does suggest ways of raising the necessary funding. He can gently guide students through the nightmare of editing their own work where decisions as to which images to leave out frequently cause the photographer untold heartache and misgivings.

His very positive views are delivered with quiet authority and he does seem to wish to push students in certain directions. For example, there was one student who was strongly advised to consider making videos instead of stills of a particularly interesting and probably once-in-a-lifetime project. That the student had no experience in this field was discussed, but it did seem to me that he was being guided in a direction totally foreign to him and could be entertaining a minefield of problems with the end result possibly being a nil return of usable work and a very significant opportunity missed. After all, when a photographer and teacher with the reputation and achievements of Chris Killip pushes so hard the temptation is to follow the advice. Clearly, this is a personal observation rather than a downright criticism, for Killip's track record as a teacher is second to none. Certainly, I was given food for thought after his comments on the content of my own recent work in Belfast. Using one image as an example, he suggested a direction for the continuation of the work I had never considered, and which I would agree gives a stronger indication of the story I attempted to tell.

As usual, Duckspool as a workshop venue is first class where the food and hospitality are up to the usual standard and the general atmosphere is relaxed and conducive to photographic debate. Chris Killip's relaxed and sometimes contradictory style of assessing student's work and discussing his own is different from any other teacher that I have experienced. As a result, I was motivated enough to look at a different approach when planning and photographing future projects.

I did find myself disagreeing with some comments and assessments given by Chris but that in itself suggests that his comments have hit a nerve and is one of the reasons for attending such workshops. Certainly, I felt that Chris justified the way he had photographed the Seacoalers in Northumberland all those years ago although I still feel that the overall impression given by the photographs is a little misleading. Regardless of any personal feelings, the work in question is worth seeing for it contains some beautiful images and certainly stands the test of time.

One of the most interesting parts of the workshop for me was when Chris talked about the history of photography, his own photography and that of the photographers who have influenced him. His knowledge and thoughts on those photographers who have influenced the development of photography are interesting and not always what you would expect. He does not always agree with the general view, particularly when it is written by the American school of historians and seems to feel that photographers from Eastern Europe have been a greater influence than they have been given credit for. This was supported by slides of some powerful photography from that part of the world and I do agree that he has a point.

I found it very revealing and felt that the long round trip from Scotland to Somerset was well worth it. Peter Goldfield, who runs Duckspool, seems to have a knack of inviting excellent tutors to lead a varied program of workshops: long may it continue.