Martin Parr: The Non-Conformists

As she explains in the introduction to the book "We started tentatively to document things that seemed to be deeply traditional, or in decline, or both." Nearly 40 years later, Martin Parr has finally compiled the images in a book. Who knew Parr started his career taking thoughtful black-and-white pictures of small town life in England? "The Non-Conformists" was Parr's first body of work after graduating from art school in 1975. His photographs of farmers, mill workers, coal miners, game keepers, shop owners, henpecked husbands and other subjects are interspersed with stories Susie Parr wrote at the time ab

Susan Mitchell, whom he had met in Manchester and later married, joined Parr in documenting a year in the life of a small Methodist chapel, together with its farming community. Such chapels seemed to encapsulate the region's disappearing way of life. In words and pictures, the Parrs vividly and affectionately document cobbled streets, flat-capped mill workers, hardy gamekeepers, henpecked husbands and jovial shop owners. Parr is a member of Magnum Photos.. Author of more than 30 photography books, including "Common Sense, Our True Intent Is All for Your Delight" and "Life's a Beach," his photographs have been collected by museums worldwide, including the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, New York's Museum of Modern Art and Tate Modern, London. Non-Conformist Methodists reject the tenets of state Anglicism, and the Non-Conformist chapel of Hebden Bridge is central to the town and its community. A retrospective of his work continues to tour major museums around the world since opening at the Barbican Art Gallery, London, in 2002. The book takes its title from the Methodist and Baptist chapels that then characterized this area of Yorkshire and defined the fiercely independent character of the town. Here Martin Parr found his photographic voice, while together he and Susie assembled a remarkable and touching historic document--now published in book form for the first time. In 1975, fresh out of art school, Martin Parr moved to the picturesque Yorkshire

He has published over seventy photobooks of his photographs, including The Non-Conformists (Aperture, 2013), Black Country Stories (2014), and We Love Britain (2014). Parr is a member of Magnum Photos.Susie Parr is a writer and researcher, and author of the critically acclaimed The Story of Swimming (2011); she and Martin Parr ma

Russ Lewis said Fascinating Stuff. Martin's known mostly for his penetrating color shots of what people look like doing their normal things, but this is early Martin Paar in black and white. It shows lives and surroundings of a time and an attitude that's long gone.. Good art! Samuel W. Pate Good art!. randomste said Perfect. Just perfect. Worth the three month wait that it took Amazon to source a copy.