(Photo credit: Tristan Poyser)
You are invited to the launch of The Invisible In-Between: Public Participation exhibition. Running alongside FORMAT International Photography Festival as part of the Inaugural Derby Photo Fringe on Thursday 14 March, 3-5pm at the Intu Derby Eagle Market. It will be exhibited to the general public from 15 March until 14 April.
The Invisible In-Between: An Englishman’s Search For The Irish Border, began as a response to the results of the UK’s Brexit referendum. Tristan Poyser has spent the last two years travelling and photographing the full length of the 510 km Irish border.
The exhibition showcases the public participation element of The Invisible In-Between: An Englishman’s Search For The Irish Border. Members of the public are asked to consider the impact of their Brexit referendum vote, on those living on the Irish border and how it will impact the future. They are asked to tear a photograph of the border, where they think the border is, and write a comment about this two-year period of uncertainty and Brexit. The exhibition shows a large selection of the 200 participants' contribution to date.
In the work the materiality of the border is shown through a physical tear, making the invisible, visible. The act of tearing creates uneasiness, evoking notions of the political and economic tensions surrounding the border's position within the Brexit negotiations, symbolising the divorce of the UK from the 27 remaining states. The Invisible In-between shows the viewer the reality of the border and encourages them to explore the intangible nature and uneasiness surrounding it.
Tristan walked areas of the Irish border with Irish-born poets Conor O’Callaghan and Jacqui Devenney Reed, and consulted with author of The Rule of the Land: Walking Ireland's Border Garrett Carr.
In an introduction to the Invisible In-between Garrett Carr writes: “Poyser went further than just photographing the route of this invisible frontier. He has taken hold of the physical photographs and ripped them along the borderline. Each tear is, I think, a stroke of brilliance. It is more of an act than a mark, although it has left a visual record of itself, and it is more eloquent than one hundred newspaper articles about the border.”
This element is the pre-cursor to Poyser’s first solo exhibition of The Invisible In-Between: An Englishman’s Search For The Irish Border at Belfast Exposed Gallery. Launching on Thursday 28 March. A small selection will be shown In the main FORMAT photography festival as part of East Meets West.
Tristan is supported by Belfast Exposed Gallery as a Futures Artist and was awarded a short term artists residency by the Gallery Of Photography, Dublin. Tristan was recently awarded the RBSA (Royal Birmingham Society of Artists)Photographic Prize 2019 for the project.
The Invisible In-Between: Public Participation. Intu Derby Eagle Market, Stall 20AB, Derby. Runs from 15 March-14 April.
The Invisible In-Between: An Englishman’s Search For The Irish Border. Belfast Exposed Gallery, Belfast 29 March-27 April.