I'm in a small Cornish Town that's gained fame internationally both for its fish and its art.
This is Newlyn
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Newlyn in Southwest Cornwall has been a fishing port for at least 600 years and
to this day remains England's largest port for the landing of fish - up until the 1960s
the port was particularly famous for pilchards so-called Cornish sardines - it's no surprise
that the fish markets are bountiful here and you can eat incredibly well
It remains of course a dangerous profession and the evocative Newlyn Fisherman Memorial by Tom
Leaper watches over each departing vessel. In the late 19th century Newlyn became famous for
its artists' colony led by Stanhope Forbes - the artists were entranced by both the
light and also the lives of the close-knit fishing Community, many of whom lived in terrible poverty.
This little oasis in Old Newlyn remembers the Rosebud, a fishing vessel that sailed all the
way to Westminster to protest against the slum clearances on this very spot. The best
way to discover Newlyn is to purchase the informative little book Walk Newlyn
and then set off! before I go though time for a quick pasty from Aunty May's - that is so good!
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the unassuming red and white Hut next to the lighthouse carries nationwide importance - it's
the Tidal Observatory, setting the mean sea level from which the Ordinance survey has measured all
heights in the UK since 1921 - and guess where the Pilgrims and their vessel the Mayflower made
a final stop for clean water in 1620 before sailing to the Americas? you've guessed it,
right here yet another Newlyn claim to fame! Newlyn Art Gallery opened in 1895 and I was lucky
enough to meet director James Green to find out more about its ethos and objectives. Newlyn art
gallery - the history - is all very rooted in the 19th century and the movement of artists to Newlyn
seeking a kind of romantic idea of kind of peasant life and the depiction of that in those those
paintings. We've had a really interesting kind of 120 - 130 years since 1895 when the gallery
opened and Cornwall and Newlyn has always been a place where, rather than being kind of anchored
in that particular moment in history, it's always been a place where Contemporary Art and artists
have been attracted to do interesting work and actually right through to the sort of, you know,
the 21st century there are lots of artists who are attracted to places like Newlyn but a real kind
of, there's a real sort of sense of community here and the artists make a big part of that,
so it's a very interesting place where artists and fishermen and fishing families still work together
kind of very closely and there's definitely a sort of very vibrant scene here. I think it
kind of goes through sort of cycles but we're at a moment where a lot of Independent Artists
and galleries are opening up in the village uh there are places like Jupiter Gallery which is
having a really significant effect in terms of supporting emerging artists' practice in
the village and all sorts of different forms of practice, so there's a kind of a real tradition
around painting in Cornwall that continues but there are all sorts of artists making work with
film and video and performance and installation which is really fascinating too, and we hope to
reflect all of that in our programming as well as national with international work alongside [Music]
Renowned local artist Henrietta Graham spent weeks with the fishermen of Newlyn both on
land and at sea, and the results are captured in these evocative
images that you can find along the wall of the fish market [Music].
It's great to see that the art scene in Newlyn is not stuck in the past and certainly hasn't
sold out to tourism - if you don't believe me step into the Jupiter Gallery. Jupiter gallery is about
promoting young and local uh well not just young any age of artists tomake
art more inclusive to everyone, yeah so I'm a stencil artist so I
I put the stencil on and I smear oils over the stencil then I pull it off and then I leave it
for about two weeks it takes to dry, so it's a long time but then you get this - and I don't mind
if people touch my art as well - so you get this like nice texture on it when you touch- you know
from the oils and stuff. I actually started doing these before the coronavirus happened and about a
month before or something I started doing all of them and I never did do the coronavirus for some
reason. Some of the issues that you know Cornwall faces like the Airbnb - trying to bring some
awareness that you know it's all being taken over by Airbnb and holiday lets. My art is to do with
recycling - upcycling - it's about how much waste we have in society. I make all of my things from
stuff I find on my way home or when I'm wandering about. I see how much waste there is everywhere
um and I can't help myself, I pick things up I take it home and make it into something - this
is made from, this is from up the fields where I live - lamps made from old TV rental meters
you put a sixpence in to turn to watch the Telly. My jewellery is all from inner tubes
bicycle tubes. So I found this image minus the Hazmat guy in Newlyn charity shop and uh
so I took it back here - undid it - cut this little guy out -stuck him in then put
my name next to L Avery and now it's in the gallery again - so upcycled it - and
hopefully L Avery will come in and enjoy it as well. I hope she doesn't mind!
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Now is it possible to find the perfect combination of fishing art and sustainability here in Newlyn?
Well Yes, it is! So I'm Stevie, I'm a Newlyn girl, I grew up in Newlyn as did my father,
my grandfather, and generations back. We can date our family back to about 1700s in this
area. So this is gillnet, this is the gillnet that fishing boats out of Newlyn use
and it has a short life expectancy, so it's up to about six months and then it can't be used,
so basically what happens is that it then gets put into landfill, but what we do is we've got
a company locally here called Fishy Filaments that reduces it down to a micro pellet which then
gets formed into a filament so that's a hundred percent gillnet and that filament then gets fed
into a 3D printer - and that's when I got really excited (!) because I then was able to produce my
series of Lights - this is a candle holder and there were two other sizes that came along which
were electric and I put my Gyotaku fish onto it - so you've got my Gyotaku artwork - fish that I get
from Newlyn, I put the paint onto it put the paper on the top, create a print and then embellish it
and then I eat it so my Gyotaku fish I've then put onto here - so the narrative for this is
the net that caught the fish that I printed and ate is now a picture on the wall is being lit by
the net that caught it. Honoured to be invited by Selfridges last year to be part of their Project
Earth with my gillnet fishing lights - Sea into the Light I call it. It was caught and cooked in
the morning we were moored up between Bryher and Tresco and I went and got the crab from Amanda
Pender and then went back onto the boat and put the paint on it -and as you can see this is the
actual crab there like that that I printed and then later that night we sat in front of Fraggle
Rock and ate the crab - so everything gets eaten. So that's the actual crab from from the Isles of
Scilly. I've seen Newlyn go through The Good the Bad and the Ugly and it's just wonderful to be a
part of the way Newlyn is now, where it's still a little bit gritty and rough around the edges,
but lots of locals are now taking their crafts and what they can do and especially like,
you know, for example what I do here, and we're making our businesses about Newlyn in Newlyn!