Southwell Workhouse, Nottinghamshire

click photo to enlarge
A small magazine that I edit recently carried an article written by a man who was sent to the workhouse in Boston, Lincolnshire, at the age of 6 years old, following the death of his parents. What made the episode even more heart-rending was the fact that he went to live there with his younger brother but his siblings were looked after by relatives. It was an experience that the writer detested, circumstances from which he tried to escape, and a place he was glad to see the back of when he was old enough to leave.

I thought about this man's story as we walked down the path in today's photograph, through well-tended vegetable patches, towards the large workhouse building, one of a group that constituted, from 1834, the Southwell Poor Law Union Workhouse. It was our second visit to a building that was erected in 1824 for 158 poor people of all ages who could not, mainly through age or infirmity, support themselves. Most "inmates" were elderly but some were of working age and there were children too. From the outset a great stigma attached to being sent to the workhouse. People who were subjected to its spartan regime felt failures, and whilst there were those who went willingly because the alternative was homelessness, hunger and death, there were many who went reluctantly and looked forward to the time when they would be able to leave.

To my twentieth and  twenty-first century eyes the building looks forbidding, having all the welcoming character of a factory or a prison. Passing into the outdoor exercise yards, where inmates were segregated by age and sex, the penal comparison becomes stronger. Walking up and down the stairs from sparsely furnished room to sparsely furnished room - all very much the same - and down into the depths where food was prepared, the feeling of a prison was further reinforced.

The building is in the care of the National Trust, one of the buildings they have bought and opened to the public that is not a former country house. Perhaps, as I said to my wife, an antidote to the excess of their multiple mansions.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Olympus E-M10
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 12mm (24mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/1250 sec
ISO:200
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Aspect ratios and indoor photography

click photo to enlarge

I was speaking to someone the other day about the four aspect ratios that the Lumix LX3 camera offers. They are 3:2, 4:3, 16:9 and 1:1. This person used a Canon camera and said he favoured the 3:2 format. In fact, he said, he couldn't imagine using any other aspect ratio. When I probed for the reason he said he'd got used to it when shooting 35mm film cameras. I suppose we all look at these things from our own perspective, but I too was a long-time 35mm film photographer, and I love the choice of different aspect ratios that cameras such as the LX3 offer today. In fact, I prefer most of their offerings over 3:2, which I find too much towards square without actually getting there. The reason for cameras using that particular size (36mm X 24mm) goes back to the adoption of movie film for still cameras, so isn't particularly grounded in aesthetics so much as necessity.

Our conversation then turned to the 16:9 ratio. My colleague was of the view that it might have an application for landscape photographs. It does, and I've posted a few on this blog. However, I find that it is also an excellent aspect ratio for indoor shots. On  a visit a while ago to Southwell Workhouse, an early nineteenth century answer to those unable or unwilling to make provision for themselves, I took several shots in this format. One was the subject of an earlier post. Today I've posted two more 16:9 images from that location to demonstrate how it lends itself not only to the great outdoors, but to the confines of indoors. The first shows a reconstruction of one of the dormitories for the inmates. The other was taken in the basement at the bottom of one of the flights of stairs that led down into the low subterranean rooms where food was prepared.

Photographs and text (c) T. Boughen

Photo 1 (Photo 2)
Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 5.1mm (24mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f2.8 (2.0)
Shutter Speed: 1/320 (1/125)
ISO: 80 (400)
Exposure Compensation: -1.0 (-0.66) EV
Image Stabilisation: On

What we've gained and what we've lost

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There is often something of Candide to comments people make about living in a developed country in the 21st century, with many feeling that "all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds." So, it is a surprise, but also refreshing, to come across a piece that not only recognises the benefits of modern life, but also looks at its downside and reminds us of some of the things that we have lost in arriving at our present state of grace. In a recent presentation at the Hay Festival David Boyle and Andrew Simms of the New Economic Foundation did just this.

Looking past the short life spans, terrible medical and dental care, lawlessness, etc. of the twelfth century they listed some of the areas where that period in history bettered our time. They commented on the "debt-free living", frequent holidays, lack of a work ethic, the concept of a "just price" for goods, and much else. A small farmer, they calculate, could have a comfortable existence (in twelfth century terms) on 195 days work, leaving 170 days available for holidays. By 1564 the farmer would need to work 280 days. Thereafter the amount of free time for people has declined to the point where today most families need two full-time workers with relatively short holidays if they are to support a home and family. If our world is to maintain its population at a level that is fair and sustainable then thinking of this sort needs to enter the mainstream discussion of economics.

I was thinking about this when I was deciding which photograph to post from my recent collection. This image of Southwell Workhouse's main entrance seemed to be a useful partner for my thoughts. It dates from 1824, derives some of its form from ideas about prison architecture, and became something of a model for those wanting to spend less on the deserving and undeserving poor of parishes during the early nineteenth century. It has been restored by the National Trust and is open to the public. The building is not without interest, but I can't help but feel that the Trust needs to spend some money on displays to better explain, and to fill, its endless series of small rooms.

This earlier blog post was taken in the room behind the front door.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 11mm (22mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/800
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.7 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Enigmatic people and the 1960s

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I've always had a liking for cinema, and being British that has meant that most of the films I've seen have been English-language movies originating in the UK or the USA. Perhaps that's why I've also had a fondness for the cinema of other countries - as an antidote to the way the Anglophone world constructs film, and for a glimpse of the wider possibilities that exist within the medium.

The other evening I watched "La Antena", a 2007 black and white film from Argentina about a dystopian city ruled by Mr TV. It was a kind of homage to German Expressionist cinema (think Fritz Lang's "Metropolis" (1927)), and had a mixture of live actors, paper sets and cartoon-like action. Its themes were totalitarianism and media power through monopoly. There was little spoken dialogue (Mr TV had stolen everyone's voices!), but plenty of Spanish subtitles (with English translations below). It was a film quite unlike any I'd ever seen before, visually rivetting, and one that probably couldn't have been made in the UK or the USA. A few weeks earlier I'd watched a Lebanese film set in Beirut, "Caramel" (2007), originally titled "Sukkar banat". This romantic comedy set in a hairdressing salon was wonderful - touching, funny, finely acted and directed, an insight into another culture, and a film that, for me, demonstrated how the conventions of English-speaking cinema could be adopted and adapted.

My introduction to foreign films came about in the 1960s when BBC2 TV regularly broadcast such things. I recall seeing several Eisensteins, many French films, and some fascinating work by Italian directors. In particular I remember a selection by Michelangelo Antonioni featuring Monica Vitti: films such as "L'avventura" (1960) and "L'eclisse" (1962), that take alienation in modern society as their theme, and have scenes that are carefully composed in a painterly way, with figures standing enigmatically in sparse surroundings. This sort of cold, detached style has its appeal, though you wouldn't want a diet that consists solely of it. However, it was these films (and the British TV series, "The Avengers") that came to mind when I composed this shot in a brightly lit room in Southwell Workhouse. This 1824 building is open to the public and is the most complete remaining example of a type of building that was once found across England. The three figures, each listening to an audio commentary about the room in which they found themselves, have that enigmatic feel of those 1960s films, and I just had to convert the image to black and white to emphasise the effect.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 5.1mm (24mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f2.8
Shutter Speed: 1/250
ISO: 80
Exposure Compensation: -1.0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On