This talk was part of an In Conversation event with Art Historian Professor John Morrison, held as part of the Berwick Literary Festival 2024. The event marked the conclusion of the LS Lowry exhibition, Lowry and the Sea, at the Granary Gallery in Berwick. It explored questions of taste, identity, and popularity in relation to Lowry’s landscapes and seascapes created in and around Berwick-upon-Tweed.
My presentation drew on my research into identity, the landscape, and the apparatus and nature of depiction. The talk referenced previous projects, including my recent Depictions of Hounslow project, to examine ideas about the interrelationship between a place’s identity and the way it is depicted.
The talk proposed that contemporary decisions regarding the appearance and imagination of Berwick—and other northern parts of the UK’s landscape and cityscape—are shaped by the way these places are depicted. Lowry’s popularity as a quintessentially ‘northern’ artist contributes to this narrative.
The talk focused on three aspects of my approach to artwork to consider Lowry’s impact:
1. Taste and Ideas of ‘Authority’ – framed by Pierre Bourdieu’s Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste, which argues that taste is not purely individual but a social construct.
2. Relatability and the ‘Nature of the Encounter’ – with reference to my previous project, Rezension, which explored the moment, or event, of the encounter with 15th-century Gothic sculptures.
3. Depiction and Perception of Place – examining how the way a place is depicted affects how it is imagined and, ultimately, the decisions we make about our environment.