Our day out: using archival photos for memory stimulation
1. Our Day Out:
Using archival photographs for memory
stimulation.
Emily Parsons, Liverpool John Moores University
2. • LJMU Special
Collections
and Archives
• Popular culture:
music, theatre,fashion
counterculture
• Support research and
teaching
• Civic engagement and
cultural partnerships
The Keith Medley photographic archive, mainly a large collection of glass plate negatives depicting the people and local events in Liverpool and Merseyside from the 1960s to the 1980s, is held at Liverpool John Moores University Special Collections and Archives. Senior lecturer Ian Bradley from the Liverpool Screen School at LJMU secured a small Heritage Lottery grant to fund a community project using photographs of days out, fun fairs, beach scenes and holidays in the region. Working with local groups such as Age Concern, Ian is using the selected images to start discussions with elderly people about their family memories of days out. LJMU students have been trained in oral history techniques to help record the stories, and have helped participants create print and digital postcards from their own holiday photographs.
An exhibition at the Museum of Liverpool in autumn 2014 will show the work created and help publicise the existence of the Keith Medley Archive to a wider public. The project draws on, and will add to, the existing good practice in the sector using archival materials with elderly people and there are plans to build on this work in the future at LJMU.
This panel will consider how collections (whether belonging to archives, museums, or libraries) can be physically combined and presented to wider society whether through joint research projects, exhibitions or events. What are the benefits of inter-disciplinary, cross-sector curation, what are the challenges?
Panel Chair: Sue Worrall, Cadbury Research Library
Overview of collections
Collection strategy
Outreach – e.g. Heritage Open Days, Explore Your Archive
Keith Medley was a commercial and press photographer – after WW2 (worked in Marine Aircraft Experimental Establishment in RAF) set up in Wallasey with RAF colleague Bob Bird – became sole owner in 1964.
Donated in 2009 by Jon Medley (previously held in out building and basement by lady who ran local history society – sand!!)
Consists of c. 30,000 (mainly) glass plate negatives
Very few prints, not physically arranged in any kind of order, needs repackaging and conservation in some cases, but we do have the registers
Project led by Ian Bradley at screen school – HLF small grant (£5,000) – to work with the community to capture memories of family days out, using archival photographs to stimulate memory
The Poppy Centre (Age Concern) & Kensington Fields Community Association
Students in media production – were paid through workbank – 2nd years, had done ‘vox pop’ style interviews before
Training – 3 sessions by Stephen Kelly from the Oral History Society
Memory packs assembled for initial workshops
List subjects of photographs
Workshops encouraged personal recollection and lively debate about family outings to the seaside.
Recorded & used to inform further interview topics. -> one to one interviews in front of camera
Postcards for each participant in one to one interviews – includes excerpt from interview & QR code to get to full interview
Participants given copies to send to family & friends.
Website developed as part of the project – will have video on it when it’s ready
Memories captured online too – can submit your memories
Exhibition – prints from collection (modern prints), large version of postcards, display of video, launch event 12th November. On until September 2015
What’s next?
HLF bid for collection as a whole – to build on this and a previous exhibition at Walker of portraits
more community work from LJMU
Ian hoping to take this project into schools to discuss their experiences in relation to the current participants.
Participants
- sharing their memories is a very positive exercise, psychologically beneficial, enjoyable. Exhibition means they feel part of something, postcards mean they have something tangible to take away.
Students
- additional training on interview techniques, specifically linked to oral history interviews. Interacting with people they might not normally – very good experience for their future careers
LJMU
- spreads the word about the collection, gets the images out there, with not much funding.
- prints to add to the collection, techniques learned
Wider public
- exhibition will open people’s minds to the possibilities of archives, and help them to engage with the sources and the memories captured.
- awareness of LJMU Archives
Participation
- getting groups to participate, then individuals willing to be interviewed 1to1
- ‘political’ issues – Bird problem
Training
- for students and us (paid for from project money), paid them to ensure retention and because it was not part of their course, emphasised benefits of this kind of additional work to them
Finding images!
- collection not catalogued or sorted, although we have registers finding the actual negative could be a challenge, conservation needs and specialist digitisation
