Richard Grassick's new photographic exhibition chronicles and compares life in the former pit communities of East Durham and the shipyards of Bremerhaven in Germany. He talks to Christen Pears.

WHEN Richard Grassick moved to the North-East from his native Scotland in 1974, he settled in the colliery village of Langley Park, a few miles west of Durham City. Six months later, the pit closed and an entire way of life disappeared.

As a photographer, Richard was fascinated by what he witnessed and began to chronicle the community's experiences on film. His slide show, A Pit Village Without Coal, was exhibited the following year. Thirty years on, the lives of the people in County Durham's former mining communities still fascinate him.

"There has been a huge transition in people's lives over the last few years. Some have coped with it and others haven't and it's not just question of losing jobs or finding new work. The pit dominated life in the villages. There was a kind of mono culture that dictated everything so there are many more psychological questions, lifestyle questions," he says.

"There have been other problems too, crime and drugs in particular, problems that weren't there before. When the pits were open, the community policed itself. Everyone knew what everyone else was doing, but now people have moved away and others have moved in. Everything has changed."

The people in the west of the region had more time to adjust. When the pits closed there, they were able to travel east for work, but when the last deep coal mine closed at Easington in 1993, there was nowhere left to go. Everyone had to adapt.

Britain is not unique. Countries across Europe have seen a dramatic decline in heavy industry over the last 20 years.

Richard's latest exhibition, Post Industrial, opens at Newcastle's Side Gallery on Saturday. Part of Coalfield Stories, Side's ongoing exploration of post-industrial life in County Durham, it compares parallel experiences in the Durham coalfield and the shipyard town of Bremerhaven in Germany - the common themes and differing approaches that have characterised the changes in each country.

In Bremerhaven, there are still vestiges of the old life, although much of the shipbuilding industry has now disappeared. In 1985, the city employed 6,456 workers in shipbuilding. Ten years later, only 25 per cent of those jobs remained.

The once run-down industrial landscape is being transformed by regeneration projects; the crumbling and rusting machinery of the shipyards has been swept aside to make way for the manicured grassy verges of the tourist-friendly river front. But, as Richard points out, it may be more aesthetically pleasing but it's essentially empty, made possible only by the demise of the shipbuilding yards.

There are plans to use the skills of the existing workforce for new projects such as offshore wind farms but there is little optimism and some of the political battles resemble those that took place in Britain in the 1980s.

"The problem is that it needs investment and the Government is saying it can't afford it," says Richard sadly.

The photographs that make up the exhibition were taken between 1999 and 2003. At first, Richard intended to make a straightforward comparison between the two areas, but as differences in language, culture and accessibility emerged, the photographic approaches began to differ.

Although shipbuilding was key to Bremerhaven's prosperity, the community was never as close-knit as the mining villages and the images of Durham are more personal - intimate photographs of ex-miners going about their daily lives. In Bremerhaven, the focus is broader. Large format landscapes provide the context for the changes in the shipbuilders' lives.

In 1999, when Richard began to explore East Durham, the mining culture was second nature to him. The first people he had met in the North-East were from the mining community and the characters he met in East Durham were similar to his friends and neighbours in Langley Park.

He photographed four ex-miners, all with differing experiences, and early on in the project he converted from colour to monochrome film. "Often I was indoors; often people's feelings mattered more than striking colours," he explains.

His stark black and white photographs examine the ways in which the men have reconstructed their lives following the closure of the pits. Motorbike enthusiast Leo has found a new role caring for his Down's Syndrome son and is happy with his new life. Joe, who played the lead in the film, Like Father, is a bandsman and singer. He admits he did everything wrong - blew the redundancy money, drank too much and wrecked his marriage - but is now building a new life. Les and Jimmy share an allotment, regularly go on fishing trips with other former pitmen but have also had to change their sense of self.

"All four welcomed me into their lives, and the images that came out of that process reflected that proximity," says Richard. "There was a massive degree of trust. I'm amazed at how people open themselves up to a relative outsider. There's almost an element of therapy about it. They release feelings they might not have been able to otherwise."

In Germany, the process was very different. Not only was he still trying to get to grips with the language in 1999, he also faced barriers of a different kind. North Germans are known, even in Germany, for their restraint, and Richard found them difficult to relate to.

Family and work commitments in England meant his time in Bremerhaven was limited, although, by returning every six months or so, he was able to get a handle on what was happening in the industry and how the workers who were left perceived the changes.

As in Durham, he worked with four men but his work was necessarily more detached. He explored the lives of shipbuilders and former shipbuilders Jurgen, Peter, Joachim and Wolfgang, but within a much broader context.

The two chapters in the exhibition reflect the different processes but, in each case, Richard has constructed a visual narrative for the gallery wall. Visitors will also be able to further explore the lives of the pitmen and shipyard workers through a series of interviews on DVD.

He says: "The loss of traditional, heavy industries is a phenomenon common to many regions of Europe. As governments, local and national, try to come to terms with the shift in industrial work to the developing world, thousands of workers are facing the same life questions.

"I've been able to develop this exhibition because a number of people both here and in Germany were generous enough to allow me access to their lives and were prepared to open up on the ambivalences and uncertainties they feel."

* Post Industrial will run at the Side Gallery in Newcastle from Saturday to August 22. For more information, call 0191-232 2208

* Richard will be discussing his work at the gallery on Saturday at 2pm. Everyone is welcome.

Published: 29/06/2004