Tom Hunter has always found inspiration for his images in the area where he lives in Hackney, portraying communities in portraits that celebrate the diversity and vibrancy of his London Borough. His visual references from Classical art to Vermeer and the Pre-Raphaelites not only result in work that has remarkable beauty and saturated tonal lushness, but also elevates often marginalized communities to the subject of high art portraiture. Are You Being Served? at the V&A Museum of Childhood uses one long wall at the entrance to the museum to display sixteen images of local shopkeepers. This is a body of work that Hunter has wanted to make for some years, the selection on display is pared down from over thirty images all shot in 2008. Double hung and curated to be read as a complete work one moves from one image to another drawn by compositional decisions and colour relationships informed by Hunter’s meticulous attention to detail and process.
Shot on a large format camera using natural light and a long exposure, part of the dignity of these works is the artist’s integrity in ensuring that his subjects are collaborators in the making process, a strategy he has deployed since he first began making images of his community. At a time when many small shopkeepers are finding it hard to compete against homogenised corporate competition there are hints of David Bailey’s 1962 images of London East End shop fronts taken as small businesses were disappearing. Unlike Bailey’s, Hunter’s photographs appear to be images flooded with colour and optimism. Untitled (tyre shop) exemplifies Hunters ability to see classical and historic beauty in the overlooked. Two Cypriots, a mechanic and the young woman proudly stand illuminated by the natural light that floods through the garage door surrounded by the tools of their trade. In poses similar to Holbein’s The Ambassadors the accompanying sixteenth century books and instruments have been transmuted to an East End workshop with car tyres and batteries while leaves blown onto the floor from outside confuse our sense of space. As our eye traces across the image from the red bucket to the standing figures to the spilt green paint and colourful door frame we find ourselves in classic Hunter territory: the ordinary and overlooked elevated to the extraordinary.
Hunter’s series was initially inspired by the museum’s model of a nineteenth century Butchers Shop with its three generations of a family standing in front of their wares. This is transported to an image of three Turkish men standing proudly in front of the counter of their kebab shop. The textures and patterns from the mock parquet floor to the shiny reflective surfaces seduce our eye “you forget how beautiful these places are when we walk into them blurry eyed,” Hunter explains. There are hints of Peter Blake’s The Toy Shop, 1962 in the multilayered vibrancy of a Newsagents shop with its shelves of local and branded drinks, every surface covered with goods. Yet these are not nostalgic portraits. The welder who stands resolutely in the middle of his workshop in white overalls is firmly a contemporary image. Hunter’s use of Fuji transparency film gives a rich green glow from the sodium lights, contrasting with the red hoardings glimpsed through the garage door. Many of the images reference travel and transport; two African men wait in their goods shop, a strangely surreal enormous patterned case placed in the background waiting for a customer. In another image, a car dealer stands elegantly attired in his black suit between his two Figaro cars. Local businesses reflect the community and its needs so the humus, feta cheese, honey and olives in the local Turkish shop are evidence of the growth in that community. From behind the counter the owner gazes at us resolutely, the gold and red reflection above his head giving him an iconic resonance.
As we are led on our multicultural journey we see unusual packaging, Buddhist shrines, refrigerated cases full of cream cakes, pickled eggs and fish and chips in a Chinese takeaway. We are variously in Thailand, Turkey, China, Italy, the traditional East End; this is not the territory of corporate shelf stacking or big business, but something more family orientated, personal and visually sensual.
Each portrait reflects East London’s social and cultural demography and the hopes, aspirations, work ethic and pride of its small businesses, one of the messages that Hunter wishes to make explicit in the work. He wants us to admire the achievements of his subjects. Beyond this we are seduced by the quality of the portraiture: the empowering poses, lush colour and painterly composition. Are You Being Served? arrests our gaze to contemplate stilled moments in busy lives and the ceaseless ebb and flow that is the captivating diversity of London.
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