Daughters of the Soil by Joanne Coates

Joanne Coates is a working-class photographer born and based in North Yorkshire. Working across the North of England, Coates explores rurality, social histories of class, and inequalities relating to low income through photography, installations and audio. Coates was educated first in working class communities, then at The Sir John Cass School of Fine art (Fda Fine Art) and The London College of Communication (Ba Hons Photography). Her practice revolves around process, participation, and working with communities. She is interested in questioning stories around power, identity, wealth, and poverty.

In 2020 Coates was commissioned as artist in residence at The Maltings and Newcastle University where she developed Daughters of the Soil, exhibited at The Maltings in 2022. In 2017, she was one of the artists working in Hull, for the UK City of Culture. In 2016, she was awarded the Magenta Flash Forward Top 30 emerging talent in the UK, and in 2012, during her Foundation year, she was awarded a Metro Imaging Portfolio Prize, a Magnum Portfolio Review and The Ideastap innovators award.

When I first played with disposable cameras as a child I didn’t know what a photographer was, I didn’t know that you could have a job as an artist.

This way of sharing views of the world, of communicating through images started young. I didn’t have access to any expensive digital cameras or kit. These cheap little boxes loaded with 35mm and covered in paper were my way of communicating. I struggled with expressing myself verbally, visually there was a whole other world of possibilities.

Last month my first solo show launched at The Gymnasium Gallery in Berwick-upon-Tweed. The work will tour to Yorkshire and Vane gallery in Newcastle and is supported by Arts Council England. Could I have ever thought this possible a few years ago? No.

It all began in 2019 with an application for Artist in Residence at Berwick Visual Arts and Newcastle University. The topic…Women in Agriculture. The reason I felt compelled to apply was I had already begun making work around women in farming in 2017. On a personal level I was connected to the work. Graduating as a working class woman who lives in a rural area and trying to make it work as a full time photographer is tough. I started milking cows to get by. My partner is also a farmer and I grew up in a rural area. I was already deeply connected through my own personal history.

With that lived experience came knowledge. I knew that many women worked off farms, that many women were behind diversification projects, that many women did lots of hidden work, that many women farmed but may not call themselves farmers. You may be reading this and thinking... ’well, what can photography do?’ For me it can make the invisible visible; tell stories of those who are traditionally less visible. If no one tells these stories then these people are not represented. To be able to tell the story you need to know it. That’s where the lived experience part becomes important. Of course there are female farmers but with that inner knowledge comes a deeper story.

In the historical art world, gender bias is not a secret. Ever since stories have been told, they have been told through the voice, seen through the eyes, and felt through the experience of the masculine. As recently as 2012, only 4% of artists in The Metropolitan Museum of Art (MET) were women. In my own medium, photography, only 15% of photographers are women. In the industry, women earn on average 40% less than men[1]. This project gave me the opportunity to work with the academic Professor Sally Shortall at the Centre for Rural Economy, and our conversations about gender bias get my mind racing. The situation is no different in agriculture. Accordingto the UK Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs, only 14.9 % of registered farm holders in the UK are women.

Women aren’t as visible as men on farms, but we are seeing them. The female workforce is driving tractors, having a social media presence, and can be seen on the telly, BUT they aren’t often inheriting land. As someone who lives in a rural area I’m used to seeing women on farms. I don’t know any women that will go from farmer's daughter to farm manager.

The day I was meant to move up to Northumberland to start the work was March 26th 2020. Lockdown was announced. I stayed put, in the lowest part of the North East, in the furthest-up part of North Yorkshire. It was a hard time to make work, communicating through email chains and online messages. When it was safe to carry on making the work it was a real challenge. I usually spend a lot of time with people, chatting and observing and then making photos. I always worked outside and safety was always on my mind. The work took place over 12 months, stopped when we had to. The women carried on working. Farmers are classified as key workers.

In those North Northumberland rolling hills, I met women who could be looked upon as leaders for the future. Women who work as farmers and support the farm with diversification, with regenerative farming and care. Women who bring farming and outdoor education to local schools. Women who make the most of the situation they have. It was in these borders between Scotland and England that I found hope.

A few years ago someone asked me what my boyfriend did for work, when I said a farmer, their attitude changed drastically. “You’ll just end up a farmer's wife. ” That word, ‘just’. I cannot think of any other job where a person is defined by what their partner does. I think of all those wonderful women; some farmers, some farmers’ wives, some farm workers, some business women... ’just’ is not a word I would put in front of anything I would use to describe them.

I’m a keen advocate of voices. For women to see themselves as farmers or leaders, they need to literally see themselves as farmers and leaders. To make space and create space for this. That’s not as simple as it sounds. The Daughters of the Soil work has created a natural progression to my next body of work around working class erasure in rural spaces from a gendered perspective. It is a commission as part of the Jerwood / Photoworks award. The changes we can make as photographers may be small, we can ask questions and explore issues with art, which is what matters.

www.joannecoates.co.uk