Murtha born Patricia Anne Murtha was known as a social documentary photographer who captured marginalised communities of the north of England. Her skill was not just to document but to live it, she photographed her friend, family and community around her.
Her career was extensive with several controversial exhibitions which highlighted the conditions of society: Juvenile Jazz Bands (1979); Youth Unemployment (1981); Save Scotswood Works (1979); Do you know what this is doing to my little girl? – Home Truths in the Year Of The Child (1979) and Burying The Problem (1980), this final one highlighting social poverty on Tyneside.
The following quote has been taken from an article I came across by Emily O’Sullivan and sums up the feeling of these images:
‘The warmth of these communities, however, is something that simply couldn’t be portrayed through the lens of a middle-class photographer, and it is only depicted by Murtha because it was the society that she knew, understood, and could subsequently observe. In fact, many of the subjects were her close family members, and others were those who she had intimate friendships with, based upon a mutual understanding. She wanted to show what life was like for the people that she knew — and loved — and it was something that could never be captured by a middle-class BBC filmmaker. What draws me to Tish Murtha is not the fact that she had a good eye for photography (which she undeniably did) but that her work relies upon the commonalities between her and those that she shoots. In a way, Murtha herself is also the subject.’ (O’Sullivan 2019).
Bibliography
Websites accessed 11/05/2020
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tish_Murtha
https://medium.com/@emilyosullivan/tish-murtha-a-working-class-gaze-d376cca1771d
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=5&v=g9ovElOitCA&feature=emb_logo
https://thephotographersgallery.org.uk/whats-on/exhibition/tish-murtha-works-1976-1991
Michele Usher 