Festival Events Party
ne i r z nt e th ra o r an the o an 1
s ’ t i t a t h u W T o b a l al
o begin with, I wanted to tell you something of my background in photography and how I come to be here in the first place. I started taking pictures, at the end of the 70's. I wanted to communicate something of what it was like to be a young rootless "Traveller". Because I was one.
Alan Lodge : Photographer
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I began to record more aspects of life on the road. There is no stereotype of a festival goer or traveller that is truly representative and so the project grew to take this into account. Gatherings in the open air with music are probably as old as anything human beings have ever done. The 'Pop Festival' became a more modern manifestation of peoples desire to gather and celebrate. We are social animals. Alongside the commercial events, 'Free Festivals' developed. People were fed up with the exploitation, rules, squalor and general rip-off that so many events came to represent. They discovered something. It is a powerful vision. People lived together, a community sharing possessions, listening to great music, making do, living with the environment, consuming their needs
and little else. People looked at the various examples provided by gypsies here and in Europe; to nomadic people across the world. To try life outside the house in many different ways and to pick and select those means that make life comfortable, easy and meaningful. The 'bender', the Indian 'tipi', the Moroccan 'yurt', the Romany 'bow top', the western two-man tent, the truck and the double decker bus. Many developed a sense of common purpose and identity. There was an acceptance that modern life was too fast, expensive and polluting to the environment. We had discovered Anarchy in action, and it worked! People began working out and managing relations within 'our' communities, without reference to Them.The temperature had been rising for some time.
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a moral panic was created
Assisted by the representation in the press and their invention of the 'Peace Convoy', a moral panic was created. The papers were full of the shock horror that we have come to expect. The Sun's - "Gun convoy hippies attack police" (No mention of gun in the article!). The News of the World contributed - "The Wild Bunch - Sex-mad junkie outlaws make the Hell's Angels look like little Noddy". These were headlines read by millions of people and made modern day `folk-devils' out of essentially peaceful people. Towards the end of the 80s a cultural phenomenon began to emerge around the country resulting in an
"The Wild Bunch Sex-mad junkie outlaws make the Hell's Angels look like little Noddy"
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injection of new blood and economy to the festival scene. Rave parties were similar to free festivals in that they were unlicensed events in locations kept secret until the last possible moment. Such events offered similar opportunities for adventure and began attracting huge numbers of young people from the cities. This scene grew dramatically. Where some of these parties differed from the free festivals was that they were organised by groups such as Sunrise who would charge an entry fee and consequently make large amounts of money in the process. Not all such rave parties were of this nature however, and the free festival scene began to merge with the rave party scene producing a hybrid with new dynamism. Not everyone on the free festival
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scene was pleased with the consequences of this festi-rave fusion however. Indeed, the outcry following events like Castlemorton 1994 provided the basis for the most draconian law yet levelled against alternative British culture. Just as the Public Order Act 1986 followed the events at Stonehenge in 1985, so the Criminal Justice and Public Order Bill began its journey in 1992, pumped with the manufactured outrage following Castlemorton. By the time it reached statute two years later, it included criminal sanctions against assembly, outdoor unlicensed music events, unauthorised camping, and `aggravated trespass’. The news-manufacture used to prepare the public palate for the coming law was incessant, with media descrip-
‘aggra vated t respas s’
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tions of Travellers and party-goers including “hordes of marauding locusts” (Daily Telegraph), and “These foul pests must be controlled” (Daily Mail). The Criminal Justice Act at large criminalizes diversity and dissent and thus has implications for the wider population such as say Trade Union activity and local protests about services (the hospital, the by-pass, the local factory etc.). Fundamentally, many of its provisions are about land rights. What one can (and cannot) do on land. Which is of course, nearly always someone else's.
I believe that the communities described represent genuine endeavours in discovering enduring and sustainable ways of life and conducting experiments in how we and the planet may survive. I wish them well in these uncertain times.
Please, don't let the bastards grind you down! 7
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A bit of a Rant T here have been a lot of law changes going on, here in the UK, that affect people while trying to celebrate: alternatives, themselves, their culture. just wanting to have a nice time! and let rip with their friends. I am `middle aged' now I suppose, but since I can remember, people around me have said. "Why won't these bastards leave us alone? all we want to do is, festival, dance, party, etc. We're not doing anyone any harm". Thing is, the authorities have never agreed, and they think of `free spirits' as a threat to the state and are treated accordingly. I had much involvement with free festivals and the events and gatherings at Stonehenge. A free festival at the stones at the Summer solstice that had been happening for twelve years. Hundreds of thousands of young ( and not so young!) gathering for what was obviously a `common need' to celebrate
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together. The moral majority! general worthies, the police and the no fun brigade, banded together moved the law about a bit. Then came and hit us with sticks with much blood. It was kind of like a signal and intimidation, to stop many others coming to play with us in the fields. Because of our reputation in Britain as having a `proper
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d e h c t a w g n i e b On liberal democracy’, it was news all over the place, that our police could behave in such a way towards unarmed civilians, in pursuit of the establishments political ends. Talking to people in various countries, I know its not just Britain starting to `get tough' on deviants of various sorts. Although a lot of travelling people have left England because of the oppression of their lifestyles, some are starting to find similar law and prejudice applied to them, elsewhere as well. Some of the ideas of festivals and travelling that we have done here, have some roots in America in the late sixties with the big festivals (with the free ones building on the
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edges!)., merry pranksters etc. As well as with the ideas of gathering and celebration that go back 4 or 5 thousand years that seem as relevant now, as then. The music is only part of the mix. Many developed a sense of common purpose and identity. There was an acceptance that modern life was too fast, expensive and polluting to the environment. We had discovered a kind of 'Anarchy in Action', and it worked! People began working out and managing relations within `our' communities, without reference to `Them’ . They're still trying to squash deviance
and dissent here, now. The words `new age traveller' are dirty words here. Used by the press when they want to be rude to us. Now in `dance culture'. social action, environmental concerns .... it all goes round again. Shame isn't it . . . . .
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hrough some of my work, I’ve attempted to show that there is a common thread of concern on the way we treat each other, the ecology and the planet at large. I have always found that you don’t simply write to your MP and expect a political process to chug away and deal with your concerns and improve the situation. How, nice if it ever did. Generally, it seems a lot of people have to get quite cross about an issue and when there is enough protest, direct action, trouble and strife to highlight what’s wrong, politics and the authorities are dragged screaming and shouting eventually into action. The police uphold the law. However, it is frequently our experience that they have a considerable action in suppressing activity on behalf of vested interests, whether in government or corporations who use them at their convenience, not ours. They can often appear
as an army of occupation not reflecting the values of the community they are supposed to be serving. In more recent times, an obvious example has been the methods of surveillance employed by agencies such as the Forward Intelligence Units of the Metropolitan Police (who offer their service around the country). The National Public Order Intelligence Unit NPOIU, which exists to counter "domestic extremism", is so secretive that police will not confirm the precise location of its base or the identity of its head. According to Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary, “the NPOIU "performs an intelligence function in relation to politically motivated disorder" by "coordinating the national collection, analysis, exploitation and dissemination of intelligence on the extremist threat to public order".
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Its database contains entries on protesters not all of whom have criminal records including descriptions, nicknames and aliases. Their activities have now become so out of control that undercover police officers have been tasked to spy on citizens engaged in legitimate political actions on environment concern (the Mark Kennedy case, here in Nottingham). Spying in campaigns like on families of those involved in the Hillsborough Disaster, the family of Stephen Lawrence and their campaign and maintaining a ‘blacklist’ to assist some employers in not recruiting staff who might have ideas on worker rights and unions. Thus, I say their actions frequently exceed simply upholding the law.
I , ’ r e h t o r b ! y g l i l B u ‘ b y a M s ’ e h y a s
I labour some of these points because since as far back as I can remember …… these officers and their kind have been always ‘on my case’. My ‘Big Brother’, I say he’s a bully!
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A
lan Lodge has specialised in social issues photography for more than 40 years. Resolutely independent, he primarily shoots stock for his own photo library, rather than working to commissions. Much of his work centres on the increasingly visible control that the state exerts over our lives and choices. Social conflict, policing, and environmental protection are documented, often through coverage of protest and 'direct actions'. He has special interest to document the lives of travelling people and those attending Festivals, Stonehenge etc, what the press have often describe as 'New Age Travellers'. Another current moral panic of interest is in issues surrounding immigration and 'multicultural Britain'. With his
photography, he has tried to say something of the wide variety of people that are engaged in 'Alternatives', and youths' many sub-cultures and to present a more positive view. He has photographed many free and commercial events and has in recent years, extended the body of work to include dance parties ('rave culture'), gay-rights events, environmental direct actions, protest against the Criminal Justice Act and more recently, issues surrounding global capitalism. A post-graduate of Nottingham Trent University with an MA degree in Photography. He is a documentary photographer, a photo-journalist and ‘storyteller’ always on the lookout to cover the different strands of such related issues. He is based in Nottingham, UK
E: tash@riseup.net W: http://alanlodge.uk Copyright Š Alan Lodge 2018 Nottingham. UK
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tash@riseup.net
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