Last year I was pleased to be invited by the renown documentary photographer Janine Wiedel to contribute a forward to a new book of her legendary late 1970s photographic project Vulcan’s Forge.
The photographic series is the most incredible documentation of workers engaged in the West Midlands region’s traditional craft industries. Focusing upon workplace life and connections in Birmingham’s jewellery and metal stamping trades, the Black Country’s steel and chainmaking industries, and Staffordshire’s coal mines, potteries and steelworks.
Published by Bluecoat Press this new edition of Vulcan’s Forge is the most complete version of the project ever committed to bound print. It reflects the exhibition of the work first mounted at the Photographer’s Gallery in 1979. In addition to the photographs made in the West Midlands between 1977 and 1979 the book included some fascinating vignettes about some of the subjects of the images who Janine has either reconnected with, or been contacted by their families, in recent years. Alongside a rich seam of other material about the project and its enduring power.
Copies can be purchased from Bluecoat Press (£50/£60) here.