Two innovative exhibitions are currently showing in the gallery at Barnsley’s Civic Theatre to mark the legacy of the 1984/5 miners’ strike.
‘Coalfields: A Legacy of the Miners’ Strike’ examines the changed landscape of mining communities since the strike through photographer Andrew Foley’s images. He focuses on the 44 collieries in Barnsley, Doncaster and the South Yorkshire coalfield which were still open immediately prior to the dispute.
Each image is accompanied by information on workforce numbers and coal tonnage before the dispute, together with details of the colliery’s fate and future usage of the site.
Jeremy Deller’s ‘The Battle of Orgreave Archive (An Injury to One is an Injury to All)’ is an installation comprising texts, documents, objects, videos and other archival material about the strike. They provide a context for examining the intertwined narratives of two events: the 1984 strike itself (in particular the confrontation between striking miners and police at Orgreave on 18 June 1984), and Deller’s 2001 re-enactment of that day, filmed for a documentary by Mike Figgis.
Split between two rooms, the installation presents its materials in a way that blurs the boundaries between their status as objective documents, on the one hand, and historical relics on the other.
Admission to the exhibitions is free. They are open from Tuesdays to Saturdays until Saturday 15 November.
More information about the exhibitions is here.
Information on the Barnsley Civic Theatre is here.
Barnsley Civic Theatre
Hanson Street
Barnsley S70 2HZ
Tel. 01226 327 000
Email: enquiries@barnsleycivic.co.uk.
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