In Ep.6 of Thought Pieces, writer, editor, and curator Lou Stoppard discusses the incredible – and much overlooked – work of Shirley Baker, considering her place in the male-dominated history of photography, together with the compassionate and attentive ways in which she captured everyday life in Salford, London, and beyond.
About Shirley Baker ed. by Lou Stoppard
Shirley Baker developed her first photograph as a young girl ‘from the darkness of the coal shed’ in her hometown of Salford, Northwest England. From this moment, she developed a lifelong interest in documentary photography, amounting to a vast and celebrated archival collection that spans the length of her career, dating from the 1950s until 2000. Edited by Lou Stoppard, this book presents an extensive–and, uniquely, female–depiction of post-war life; an eccentric survey which combines her better-known street photographs of Manchester, Salford and Blackpool with previously unseen photographs that span the UK, all the way to the South of France, Italy and Japan.
Find out more here.