Skinningrove
Killip first came across Skinningrove, a North Yorkshire coastal village, during a drive up the east coast of England in 1974. But it was not until 1982 that he returned to document life. At that time, with the steel mill closing, many miners turned to fishing part-time to supplement their income.
What Chris found in Skinningrove was yet another closed community. “Like a lot of tight-knit fishing communities, Skinningrove could be hostile to strangers, especially ones with a camera,” Killip recalled in a short film produced in 2013. “Skinningrove fishermen believed that the sea in front of them was their private territory, theirs alone.” This would make the village a place, Chris stated, that was ‘difficult to see.’7 Fortunately, Killip gained the trust of several “wilder” lads who would go out to check the lobster pots each day. They vouched for Chris, even though they never asked once who he was or why he was taking photographs.
As is true with all of Killip’s photographic chronicles, the Skinningrove series reveals the
complete life of the young men who chose to trust him and captures the moments evidencing their determination to be fisherman, their thoughtful tending to boats and nets, their downtime spent lazing about in the company of their mates, their battle scars won in pub fights, and their joy at simply being able to take in the morning sun after spending the night in jail. In all of it, Killip captures the culture that defined their young lives.
Amongst this series, there is one achingly spare and intimate photograph that reveals the grief the sea delivers when it takes one of its own. It is of Simon, a young boy, being taken out to sea three weeks after his father drowned. Within this seafaring community, it was the tradition to send young survivors out to confront the sea so to overcome the fear of it. The image of this young lad, sitting in a boat contemplating the deep that swallowed his father, is to see grief in its fullest and most haunting dimension.
Loss of life was ever present in these communities. On 29 July 1986, the lobster boat of a young man named Leso overturned tossing him and his two other passengers,
Right:
'I went to my father and said: Dad, I’m going to become a photographer' Interview with Chris Killip.
Courtesy of:
Steidl Publishing
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