Review: Franki Raffles’ Activist Photography & Hannah Perry’s Manual Labour

The British photographer Franki Raffles (1955-94) died shockingly young due to complications following the birth of her twin daughters. Despite her brief life, she managed to amass an impressive collection of nearly 40,000 images of women working around the globe. Her photographs are as strong as the subjects they portray. Raffles captured women in the Philippines, Israel, China, the Orkneys, Mexico, and Ukraine.

She documented harvesters at dawn, cleaners at midnight, seasonal onion pickers, part-time teachers, and lifelong factory workers. Raffles was a tireless activist with her camera, using it to make compelling statements. For instance, anyone who waited at the bus stops of Edinburgh in the 80s might remember her striking photographic protests against male violence.

A particularly memorable photograph captures an elegant woman in a New Town flat, casually leafing through a magazine. Above runs the caption: “She lives with a successful businessman.” Below, the harsh truth reads: “Last week he hospitalised her.” Some images from this campaign still resonate today and could, unfortunately, be displayed at British bus stops once again.

After earning a philosophy degree at St Andrews University, Raffles moved to Callanish on the Isle of Lewis in the 1970s. There, she worked as a weaver for the Harris tweed industry to support her first child and her burgeoning photography career. Her firsthand experiences deeply informed her photographic vision.

In one image, a young woman in an anorak labors over a handloom in a cold, bare room where the light is so poor she needs to bend close to her work. Other photos depict weatherworn farmers in the fields, cutting ancient peat or managing sheep, often dressed in overalls and spectacles.

A sequence featuring sheep shearers is particularly moving, showing elderly women kneeling on the ground, practically eye to eye with the wriggling animals. One poignant close-up of a Lewis woman, beaming at Raffles, conveys a spirit much like the renowned Bill Brandt, though not as sombre.

This glowing smile is a common feature among the 300 images now on display at the Baltic. Generations of Russian women in overalls, taking a break from haymaking, collectively smile toward the youngest among them. Across continents, teachers, typists, nurses, and dinner ladies share their conversation and humor with Raffles’s camera.

Her work is primarily black and white, devoid of staging or exaggeration. She avoided character studies, focusing instead on situations and contexts. One project, titled “Lot’s Wife” and funded by a Wingate Trust scholarship in the early 1990s, captured the harsh lives of Jewish women emigrating to Israel following the collapse of the USSR. These women, once employed in significant roles, found themselves unemployed and isolated at home with small children.

What strikes viewers today, standing before the dense walls of Raffles’s photographs, is the sense of collective experience they depict. These images were intended to enlighten viewers, whether shown in libraries, public halls, the media, or art galleries. Now, they present a snapshot of a sense of community that feels like disappearing history.

Hannah Perry (born 1984) is a fitting partner to Raffles. Her multimedia exhibition, “Manual Labour,” examines the intersection of women’s experiences of class, work, and childbirth with the heavy industry of northern England. The exhibition moves from sublime beauty to brutal reality.

A beautiful choral piece of women’s voices echoes through the gallery as a gigantic bronze pelvis, mounted on scaffolding, starts to move. Those familiar with childbirth will recognize this structure as an evocation of labor, but Perry takes it further, introducing abrupt and startling surprises.

On a large cinema screen, girls push prams through shopping centers, visit clinics, and are scolded by overworked doctors. A pregnant woman turns among mirrors in a nightclub (Perry herself), intercut with the pelvic motions of a pole dancer. The juxtaposition of molten metal, concrete, and industrial sounds with these young women’s lives creates a complex collage.

Sheets of taut metal stretch on poles through the gallery, vibrating anxiously to the sound of nameless rumbling. At times, the film on the screen seems to quiver and pulsate like the metal sheets. The toxic world of industry (or masculinity) interweaves with these depictions of women’s experiences, sometimes too harsh to behold.

When the elements—hydraulic, sculptural, harmonic, and cinematic—come together, “Manual Labour” creates a sharp contrast between men and women’s work while also drawing parallels between their intense physical labors.

Star ratings (out of five)

Franki Raffles: Photography, Activism, Campaign Works ★★★★

Hannah Perry: Manual Labour ★★★★

• Franki Raffles: Photography, Activism, Campaign Works and Hannah Perry: Manual Labour are both at Baltic, Gateshead, until 16 March 2025

Source: The Guardian