Begin forwarded message:
> From: "John Darwell" <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: 4 March 2007 00:23:33 GMT
> To: "John" <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Dark Days
>
>
>
> Published in March
>
>
>
> dark days
>
> photographs by John Darwell
>
> texts by Liz Wells, Roger Breeze, David Black
>
>
> In February 2001 Foot and Mouth Disease arrived in Cumbria. At its
> peak Cumbria was the worst affected county in Britain with a
> staggering 41% of all cases. For the local community the
> environmental and social consequences were to prove devastating.
>
> As a local resident, John Darwell found himself surrounded by the
> effects of the disease. Over the next twelve months he committed
> himself to recording what was taking place. Despite government
> reports to the contrary, the Cumbrian countryside became largely a
> ‘no-go’ area, whilst on the farms thousands of animals were
> destroyed, their bodies burnt on the now notorious pyres. The
> ultimate cleanup of the infected farms led to extraordinary lengths
> being taken to eradicate the virus.
>
> Dark Days represents one of the most complete records of this time
> and provides a powerful and emotive insight into one of the most
> dramatic and destructive periods in British farming history.
>
>
> 'The striking thing about the photographs in John Darwell’s Dark
> Days is not in the way they exist at the nexus of memory, history
> and personal knowledge. Most photographs do that, at least for a
> while. What is remarkable is that these photographs work both as
> specific visual information and as broadly evocative symbols, in a
> way that is not usually the case with the topical or
> photojournalistic. With literalness and inclusiveness, these images
> wrench us back to 2001 with an immediacy that seems to transcend
> the visual….
>
> …Darwell has conscientiously told the story from beginning to end,
> but the images that resonate, and will, I believe, continue to do
> so are the relentlessly repeated images of isolation and closure,
> marking the desperate efforts of farmers to stay the spread of
> infection. Footpaths and lanes are marked ‘Keep Out’ in a
> disconnect that looks and feels like the end of an era. 2001 was
> the summer that England’s farms were closed and the countryside
> irrevocably changed.'
>
> Alison Nordström, Curator of Photographs
> George Eastman House International Museum of Photography and Film
>
>
> For further information please contact:
> Dewi Lewis or Caroline Warhurst
> Phone & Fax: 0161 442 9450
> Email: [log in to unmask]
>
> dark days
> John Darwell
>
> £25.00 Hardback, 192 pages
> 148 colour photos, 225mm x 245mm
> ISBN: 9781904587422
> Publication Date: March 22nd
>
> In association with Littoral Arts
> and Cumbria Institute of the Arts
>
>
> Dewi Lewis Publishing.
> 8 Broomfield Road, Heaton Moor,
> Stockport SK4 4ND, England
>
> Phone & fax: 0044 161 442 9450
> Email: [log in to unmask]
> Website: www.dewilewispublishing.com
>
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>
>> Jacqueline Butler,
>> Programme Leader
>> BA(Hons) Photography
>>
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