John Duncan: Bonfires - Hardcover

Colin Graham; Mary Warner Marien

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 3865217265 ISBN 13: 9783865217264

Publisher: Steidl, 2008

Synopsis

John Duncans Bonfires documents a long-standing tradition of bonfire building by Protestant communities in Belfast, Northern Ireland. The bonfires are built in preparation for annual 11th July celebrations, which commemorate the defeat of James Stuart at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690. The imposing bonfire structures are a powerful provocation with which Protestant identity is asserted and a sense of solidarity and continuity is re-affirmed. Duncans photographs frame and measure the structures against their various social settings, revealing both a sense of Belfasts changing urban landscape and the deep divisions that, despite political progress, still affect Northern Ireland long after the ceasefires. The bonfires have recently been challenged from a number of quarters: from within the Protestant community for damage caused to property and surrounding areas; from developers who covet the waste land they are built on; and from environmentalists who express concerns about the pollution they cause. Seen against this backdrop of competing agendas, the bonfires come to express a form of resistance, and their building a kind of raw ingenuity. Duncans work dwells on the fact that each bonfire has a singular structure, an identity. They are sculptural and architectural oddities with many resonances through history and art, from high-rise flats to military watchtowers and gun emplacements, from the Empire State Building to the Tower of Babel.

About this title

Product Description:

HardCover. Pub Date: October 2008 Pages: 72 in Publisher: Steidl. Gerhard Druckerei of und Verlag In Bonfires. photographer John Duncan documents the long-standing Protestant tradition of bonfire building-part of the annual July 11 celeation commemorating the equivalent of defeat of James Stuart at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690-in his native Belfast. The large structures on which the fires are lit serve as a powerful assertion of Protestant identity and signal a sense of community solidarity. Duncan's photographs frame these structures against Belfast's changing urban landscape. revealing the deep divisions that. despite political progress. still affect Northern Ireland long after the cease-fires. Duncan's images reveal the expressive. jerry-rigged constructions that are lit to create the ...

About this edition

• Publisher: Steidl
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 3865217265
• ISBN 13: 9783865217264
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 72