Ingrid Pollard (born 1953) is a British artist and

photographer A photographer (the Greek φῶς (''phos''), meaning "light", and γραφή (''graphê''), meaning "drawing, writing", together meaning "drawing with light") is a person who makes photographs. Duties and types of photographers As in other ...

. Her work uses portraiture photography and traditional landscape imagery to explore social constructs such as Britishness or racial difference. Pollard is associated with Autograph, the

Association of Black Photographers Autograph ABP, previously known as the Association of Black Photographers, is a British-based international, non-profit-making, photographic arts agency. History Autograph was originally established in London in 1988. Founders included the photog ...

. She lives and works in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

. In the 1980s, Pollard produced a series of photographs of black people in rural landscapes, entitled ''Pastoral Interludes''. The works challenge the way that English culture places black people in cities. From 2005 to 2007, she curated Tradewinds2007, an international residency exhibition project with an exhibition at the

Museum of London Docklands The Museum of London Docklands (formerly known as Museum in Docklands), based in West India Quay, explains the history of the River Thames, the growth of Port of London and the docks historical link to the Atlantic slave trade. The museum is pa ...

. She has participated in group exhibitions at the

Hayward Gallery The Hayward Gallery is an art gallery within the Southbank Centre in central London, England and part of an area of major arts venues on the South Bank of the River Thames. It is sited adjacent to the other Southbank Centre buildings (the R ...

and the

Victoria & Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...

. Pollard has worked as an artist in residence at a number of organisations, including Lee Valley Park Authority, London (1994), Cumbria National Park (1998), Wysing Arts, Cambridge (2000), Chenderit School, Oxfordshire (2008), and

Croydon College Croydon College is a large further and higher education college located in Croydon, within the London Borough of Croydon. Its origins can be traced to a School of Art that was established in 1868, which subsequently merged with Croydon Polytechni ...

(2011). She has also held numerous teaching positions and is currently a lecturer in Photography at

Kingston University , mottoeng = "Through Learning We Progress" , established = – gained University Status – Kingston Technical Institute , type = Public , endowment = £2.3 m (2015) , ...

. Pollard is a member of the Mapping Spectral Traces research group. In 2016 she was awarded an Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Photographic Society. In 2018 she was the inaugural Stuart Hall Associate Fellow at the

University of Sussex , mottoeng = Be Still and Know , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £14.4 million (2020) , budget = £319.6 million (2019–20) , chancellor = Sanjeev Bhaskar , vice_chancellor = Sasha Roseneil , ...

Life

Childhood

Pollard was born in Georgetown, Guyana, in 1953. When she was three or four years old, her family emigrated to the United Kingdom, where her father already lived, and she grew up in London. She has described her youthful awareness of family photographs.

"I do not remember the first time I took a photograph, but I did grow up in a house of family photo-albums and the stories that went with them. My father took lots of pictures for our albums and later I used some of these images in my own work."

Pollard began to make her own pictures using her father's box camera. As a teenager in the late 1960s, she photographed woods and sewage works in the Lee Valley, East London, for a school Geography project, a foretaste of her mature photographic work examining the landscape.

Early career and education

As a young artist, Pollard became increasingly interested in liberation movements around race, gender and sexuality. In the early 1980s, she worked at the Lenthall Road Workshop, a feminist photography and screen-printing collective in the

Haggerston Haggerston is a locale in East London, England, centred approximately on Great Cambridge Street (now renamed Queensbridge Road). It is within the London Borough of Hackney and is considered to be a part of London's East End. It is about 3.1 miles ...

area of Hackney, East London. She was one of twenty founding members of

Autograph ABP Autograph ABP, previously known as the Association of Black Photographers, is a British-based international, non-profit-making, photographic arts agency. History Autograph was originally established in London in 1988. Founders included the photog ...

(the Association of Black Photographers) in 1988. Pollard has participated several exhibitions that brought together work by Black British artists, including ''

Black Women Time Now ''Black Women Time Now'' was a 1983 art exhibition at the Battersea Arts Centre in London, featuring the work of fifteen artists announcing themselves as Black Women. The exhibition, curated by Lubaina Himid, was funded by the GLC. The participa ...

'' ( Battersea Arts Centre, London, 1984), ''The Thin Black Line'' ( ICA, London, 1985) and ''Three Black Women Photographers'' (

Commonwealth Institute The Commonwealth Education Trust is a registered charity established in 2007 as the successor trust to the Commonwealth Institute. The trust focuses on primary and secondary education and the training of teachers and invests on educational pro ...

, London, 1986). Pollard completed a BA in Film and Video at the

London College of Printing The London College of Communication is a constituent college of the University of the Arts London. It specialises in media-related subjects including advertising, animation, film, graphic design, photography and sound arts. It has approximately ...

in 1988 and, between 1986 and 1993, worked on the technical crew for a small number of film projects. Her photography was recognised in a survey edition of Birmingham's '' Ten.8'' magazine She then went on to complete an MA in Photographic Studies at

Derby University , mottoeng = Experience is the best teacher , established = 1851 – Teacher Training College1992 – gained university status , type = Public , chancellor = William Cavendish, Ear ...

in 1995. She was awarded a PhD by publication by

University of Westminster The University of Westminster is a public university, public university based in London, United Kingdom. Founded in 1838 as the Royal Polytechnic Institution, it was the first Polytechnic (United Kingdom), polytechnic to open in London. The Polyte ...

in 2016.

Work

In the 1980s, Pollard began to attract attention for her photographic series, particularly those exploring the presence of black people in the English landscape, including ''Pastoral Interlude'' (1987–1988), ''Seaside Series'' (1989), ''Wordsworth's Heritage'' (1992) and ''Self Evident'' (1995). In these series, she worked with material that evoked notions of heritage or played upon nostalgic sentiments associated with the national landscape: the souvenir postcard, the poetry of

William Wordsworth William Wordsworth (7 April 177023 April 1850) was an English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their joint publication '' Lyrical Ballads'' (1798). Wordsworth's ' ...

and hand-tinted photographs. She often placed text statements and quotations alongside her images to suggest a political framework for her photographic work. Developing such forms allowed Pollard to challenge perceptions of the countryside as being primarily inhabited and visited by

white people White is a racialized classification of people and a skin color specifier, generally used for people of European origin, although the definition can vary depending on context, nationality, and point of view. Description of populations as ...

, and the related assumption that Black British people only exist in popular consciousness in urban settings. These racially specific stereotypes of rural England are set out in the caption attached to the first image of ''Pastoral Interlude:''

"... it's as if the Black experience is only lived within an urban environment: I thought I liked the Lake District where I wandered lonely as a Black face in a sea of white. A visit to the countryside is always accompanied by a feeling of unease, dread..."

From 2005 to 2008, Pollard was engaged in a research project into the "Black Boy", a name which was once used for some

pub A pub (short for public house) is a kind of drinking establishment which is licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption on the premises. The term ''public house'' first appeared in the United Kingdom in late 17th century, and was ...

s in England. This led to the publication of Pollard's 1994 book, ''Hidden in Public Place.'' and a solo exhibition, ''Spectre of the Black Boy'' (Kingsway Gallery, Goldsmiths University of London, 2009).

Honours, awards and recognition

Pollard was awarded an Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Photographic Society in 2016. In 2018, Pollard was the inaugural Stuart Hall Associate Fellow at the

. In 2022 Pollard was one of four artists nominated for the

Turner Prize The Turner Prize, named after the English painter J. M. W. Turner, is an annual prize presented to a British visual artist. Between 1991 and 2016, only artists under the age of 50 were eligible (this restriction was removed for the 2017 award) ...

. Pollard was appointed

Member of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established o ...

(MBE) in the

2023 New Year Honours The 2023 New Year Honours are appointments by some of the 15 Commonwealth realms to various orders and honours to recognise and reward good works by citizens of those countries. The New Year Honours are awarded as part of the New Year celebratio ...

for services to art.

Bibliography

Publications by Pollard

* ''Hidden Histories: Heritage Stories''. 1994. With an essay by

Lola Young Margaret Omolola Young, Baroness Young of Hornsey (born 1 June 1951) is a British actress, author, crossbench peer, and Chancellor of the University of Nottingham. Education and career Born in Kensington, Lola Young was educated at the Parlia ...

and an interview with Liz Wells. Exhibition catalogue. * ''Near and Far''. 2001. With an essay by Susan Trangmar. Exhibition catalogue. * ''Postcard Home.''

Chris Boot Chris Boot (born 27 May 1960) is a British photography curator, book publisher, and has worked in a variety of other roles related to photography. He was director of London’s Photo Co-op, director of the London and New York offices of Magnum Pho ...

and

, 2004. * ''Hidden in Public Place.'' Occasional Papers series. London South Bank University, 2008. With an introduction by Andrew Dewdney. * ''Regarding the Frame.'' Visual Arts in Rural Communities, 2013. With an essay by Carole McKay. Exhibition catalogue. * ''Consider the Light and the Dark.'' Chateau de Sacy, France: Ateliers d'artistes de Sac, 2015. With an essay by Ella Mills. Exhibition catalogue.

Publications with contributions by Pollard

* ''Passion'', edited by Maud Sulter. Urban Fox, 1990. With a chapter of images by Pollard. * ''Stolen Glances'', edited by Tessa Boffin and Jean Fraser. Pandora Press/Harper Collins, 1991. . With a chapter of images by Pollard. * ''New Geographies of Race and Racism'', edited by Caroline Bressey and Claire Dyer. Ashgate, 2009. Pollard contributes a chapter, "Belonging in Britain-Fathers Hands".

Publications with interviews with Pollard

* ''Polareyes: A Journal by and about Black Women working in photography''. Edited by Maxine Walker, Molly Shinhat, Mumtaz Karimjee, Jenny McKenzie, Amina Patel, Samena Rana, Similola Coker,

Brenda Agard Brenda Patricia Agard (20 August 1961 – 29 October 2012) was a Black-British photographer, artist, poet and storyteller who was most active in the 1980s, when she participated in some of the first art exhibitions organized by Black-British ar ...

, Lesley Mitchell. Issue No. 1, 1987. "Ingrid Pollard talks to Molly Shinhat", page 41.

Collections

Pollard's work is held in the following public collections: *

Arts Council Collection The arts are a very wide range of human practices of creative expression, storytelling and cultural participation. They encompass multiple diverse and plural modes of thinking, doing and being, in an extremely broad range of media. Both hi ...

Victoria and Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...

Tate Tate is an institution that houses, in a network of four art galleries, the United Kingdom's national collection of British art, and international modern and contemporary art. It is not a government institution, but its main sponsor is the U ...

"Ingrid Pollard"
at Tate.

References

External links

*
"Personal Cartographies – Year 2 Agnes Poitevin-Navarre and Jeremy Wood"

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pollard, Ingrid Living people 1953 births 20th-century British photographers 20th-century British women artists 21st-century British women artists 21st-century photographers Black British artists English contemporary artists Guyanese photographers People from Georgetown, Guyana Lesbian photographers British lesbian artists LGBT Black British people British LGBT photographers Guyanese LGBT people Photographers from London Academics of Kingston University Members of the Order of the British Empire