RETRO
John Gill
Retro
I can’t really remember where I first came across John’s work, although it was most likely on social media. However, it did have a big impact on me. There was a striking familiarity in the faces and scenes that he shared from his own area around Castleford in England, documented so well in his earlier publication After The Coal Dust. I too had grown up in the Thatcher era and witnessed the demise of the local steel and coal industry, so there was a lot in John’s work that I could relate to.
Retro is John’s latest book, released in November 2024. As the name suggests this is a retrospective collection of works from the 1980’s through to the present day. It is a large volume of work, and like previous publications is geographically centred around the same area, with a few visits to the Yorkshire coast.
The book is divided into themed sections, each prefaced by John’s thoughts on the subject. Like his photography, his musings are refreshingly frank and honest. We are taken on a journey from the early days, through the streets, markets and car boot sales of his locale and then on to his 100 faces project. Also featured is some colour work, landscapes, some failed experiments and a very personal account of John’s struggle with mental health issues, realised through some very powerful imagery. The book closes with John’s thoughts on what the future holds.
For a body of work that spans more than forty years there is a remarkable consistency in the high standard of photography. Like the very best of documentarians, John has the ability to transform the ordinary into the extraordinary. While there is an underlying humour in a lot of his work there is also a caring and thoughtful documentation of humanity. His monochromatic character studies are far more than candid street portraits. They provoke an emotional response in the viewer, an empathy with the often-vulnerable faces staring at us from the page, faces that show a life lived.
In any collection of British social documentary photography, the surname Gill will find itself beside Killip and Murtha, and rightly so.
Cameron Scott
