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Billingham, Richard 
ORCID: 0000-0002-6474-5656
(2023)
Early Photographic Work Exhibited in 'The English at Home', The Centre for British Photography, London, (26 January - 30 April 2023).
[Show/Exhibition]
Abstract
Billingham exhibited early photographic work in the show 'The English at Home: 20th Century Domestic Photographs from the Hyman Collection'. The exhibition was one of a number of two inaugural shows opening the Centre for the first time. The other was called Headstrong: Women and Empowerment. The English at Home explored the central place of the home in British photography over the last century. The exhibition borrowed its title from one of the most important twentieth century photography publications, Bill Brandt’s first book, The English at Home (1935) and proposed that to understand contemporary depictions of the home there is much to learn from an exploration of a lineage that began with Bill Brandt and traveled through the crucial years of Picture Post magazine and on to the more conceptual strategies of photographers since the 1970s. The exhibition was broadly thematic and included major historical series as well as some of the most important work of more recent years. One idea of the show was to take the viewer on a journey from the street, up the front steps, and into the private spaces of the living room, kitchen and bedroom. The exhibition bagins by exploring the ways in which the neighbourhood streets were an extension of the home, a place to chat with neighbours and for children to play. It then went inside the home. Running through this was a strand that built from Brandt's work to address the ways in which these images reflect and critique the English class system. Besides Billingham, other photographers included Shirley Baker, John Bulmer, Bill Brandt, Ken Grant, Bert Hardy, Nick Hedges, Kurt Hutton, Colin Jones, Karen Knorr, Sirkka-Liisa Konttinen, Marketa Luskacova, Roger Mayne, Daniel Meadows, David Moore, Martin Parr, Charlie Phillips, Jo Spence and Edith Tudor-Hart.
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