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Stories from the bishopsgate archive
    a printmaking project in three case studies

This project has focused on stories uncovered from The Bishopsgate Institute Archive of people who have fought for different workers’ rights related campaigns. I have focused on three case studies, which I believe can teach us different aspects of advocating for ourselves and resisting.
 

The Wages for Housework Campaign (1960s – present) can show us how to organise a larger and more varied, seemingly unconnected group of people.
 

The Murder of Altab Ali (1978) shows what the political mechanisms which strive to keep us apart are, and that the passing of one law is not the end of a struggle. It also deal with memory, asking who is being remembered and why.

 

The Wapping Dispute (1986) is a perfect example for why it is important to find ways to come together and fight for our rights, as technological advancement shouldn’t only benefit employers.

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Using traditional printmaking techniques (which are laborious and trade specific) to illustrate these stories has been instrumental in personally realising the extent of the work that organisations of the past have had to do in order to fight for and gain the rights that we take for granted today. None of the benefits of today have been achieved without protest and organised resistance, and we need to be inspired by the past in order to keep moving forward.

 

Illustrations have been made through etchings, metal engravings, linocut, wood engraving and letterpress.

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The Wages for Housework Campaign
(1970 - present)

I took visual notes based on the archival material. One page of notes might equal 30 pages of flyers and documents from the archive.

The Wages for Housework Campaign
(1970 - present)

I made monoprints inspired by the material in the archive and the messages of the campaign, as if preparing for protest.

The Wages for Housework Campaign
(1970 - present)

I made aquatint etchings based on the stories from women in the archive, which is a slow, multi layered process which allowed me to sit with them for a long time. I also made a wood engraving portrait of Selma James. Woo engraving has a history of being a female dominated field in its inception, as it is a very detailed technique. Of course, women were underpaid for it at the time, so I thought it was fitting.

The Wapping Dispute
(1986)

I took another approach to note taking and made letterpress collages from the messages found in the flyers and documents in the archive. The flyers I found were also clearly made through letterpress, so I felt like I was re enacting the issues of the time. The laborious process also connected me to the roots of printmaking as a trade, as I was thinking about the print workers.

The Wapping Dispute
(1986)

I then used other relief printing techniques such as linocut and wood engraving to illustrate stories from the archive.

The Murder of Altab Ali
(1978)

I wrote a visual essay organising my research and the archival material I found, to make sense of the story and the surrounding racist movements of the time. I also went to Altab Ali Park, and The Migration Museum which had information on the garment workers from Bangladesh who settled in Brick Lane at the time.

      Click below to download Essay

The Murder of Altab Ali
(1978)

I wrote and illustrated a fantastical retelling of his story in eight copper engraving prints. Since his story had a lot of gaps, I felt like this way I was engraving it into our collective memory further.

Documentation of Process

I documented these laborious processes and shared them on social media while telling these stories, and people really connected to them stronger this way.

 

SHOP the works

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