Introduction
to the Foxhunting Photograph
Collection
My
Mother's family had been
Hunting people, with roots
going back into the South
Durham Hunt of the Nineteenth
Century - and earlier.
My Mother, who was born
in 1911, could remember
being taken to Hunt meets
before the First World
War. ( She could also
remember shopping in West
Hartlepool whilst it was
being bombed by Zeppelin
airship ).
In
the Summer of 1999 I took
a few pictures of the
local Hunt parading at
a village show. I did
it to amuse myself and
to produce a personal
aide memoire that would
act as a hedge against
an uncertain future. It
didn't occur to me then
that those few pictures
would grow into the collection
that you can view here.
The
work was paid for - by
doing without everything
else: and by getting myself
into increasingly worse
debt.
Late
in the day, the Arts Council
awarded me a small grant
to help me to continue.
I take this opportunity
to thank them for their
open - mindedness. Anybody
wishing to contact the
photographic dept. of
Arts Council in Yorkshire
can do so by writing to
them at:
21
Bond Street. Dewsbury.
West Yorkshire WF13 1AX
The
pictures here are low
resolution scans from
tiny proofs - this for
ease and economy.However,
the originals are b/w
rollfilm negatives. They
are of the highest quality
possible and will enlarge
- without loss of integrity
- to enormous sizes. There
is nothing to equal the
quality of work produced
in this way.
I
hope to take more pictures.
But
if Hunting should be banned,
then at least there will
be this record.
I
did the very best that
I could.
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