Mat Collishaw
Catching Fairies I, 1996
C- Type colour print
10824
Artist's Proof, 1 of 2, aside from the edition of three. A contemporary update of the famous Cottingley Fairies photographs. Mat Collishaw's Catching Fairies references some of the most famous...
Artist's Proof, 1 of 2, aside from the edition of three.
A contemporary update of the famous Cottingley Fairies photographs.
Mat Collishaw's Catching Fairies references some of the most famous and notorious British photographs of the twentieth century, a series of photographs taken in Cottingley, near Bradford in England in 1917 by two cousins, 10-year-old Frances Griffiths and 16-year-old Elsie Wright. The pictures, taken in the woodland near their home, appeared to show fairies and gained enormous publicity when championed by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle who declared the pictures of the Cottingley Fairies to be genuine in Strand magazine (December 1920). Arguments about their veracity fuelled debate between science and spiritualism.
However, in the early 1980s Elsie and Frances admitted what to today's eyes seems obvious, namely that the photographs were faked, using cardboard cutouts of fairies copied from a popular children's book of the time. However, Frances maintained that the fifth and final photograph was genuine.
Following the deaths of Frances in 1986 and Elsie in 1988 the photographs and two of their cameras entered the collection of the National Media Museum in Bradford, England.
Subsequently, in the 1990s there was a revival of interest in these photographs. They were parodied in a 1994 book written by Terry Jones and Brian Froud, Lady Cottington's Pressed Fairy Book and in 1997 inspired two films: FairyTale: A True Story and Photographing Fairies.
In Mat Collishaw's Catching Fairies the subject is depicted straight, without irony. Technology has moved on and the trickery is seamless. Presented this time in a London canal, Collishaw is shown stealthily trying to catch fairies.
British Photography / The Hyman Collection
A contemporary update of the famous Cottingley Fairies photographs.
Mat Collishaw's Catching Fairies references some of the most famous and notorious British photographs of the twentieth century, a series of photographs taken in Cottingley, near Bradford in England in 1917 by two cousins, 10-year-old Frances Griffiths and 16-year-old Elsie Wright. The pictures, taken in the woodland near their home, appeared to show fairies and gained enormous publicity when championed by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle who declared the pictures of the Cottingley Fairies to be genuine in Strand magazine (December 1920). Arguments about their veracity fuelled debate between science and spiritualism.
However, in the early 1980s Elsie and Frances admitted what to today's eyes seems obvious, namely that the photographs were faked, using cardboard cutouts of fairies copied from a popular children's book of the time. However, Frances maintained that the fifth and final photograph was genuine.
Following the deaths of Frances in 1986 and Elsie in 1988 the photographs and two of their cameras entered the collection of the National Media Museum in Bradford, England.
Subsequently, in the 1990s there was a revival of interest in these photographs. They were parodied in a 1994 book written by Terry Jones and Brian Froud, Lady Cottington's Pressed Fairy Book and in 1997 inspired two films: FairyTale: A True Story and Photographing Fairies.
In Mat Collishaw's Catching Fairies the subject is depicted straight, without irony. Technology has moved on and the trickery is seamless. Presented this time in a London canal, Collishaw is shown stealthily trying to catch fairies.
British Photography / The Hyman Collection