Teän Roberts (Hold Fast) - Oreweed, 2025

OREWEED, 2025

Digital giclée photographic print on 310gsm cotton rag archival paper

“In the British Isles… the kelp industry flourished where supplies of the raw material were readily available and markets for the product were close at hand, and even then, only in areas where necessity dictated that the inhabitants should indulge in this back-breaking task” – Luke Over, The Kelp Industry in Scilly, 1987.

At times kelping was profitable, but at others it was exploitative: both of the ocean’s natural resources and the labour of the inhabitants. Poverty levels in the Isles of Scilly, and lack of other available work - particularly on the smaller off-islands - meant that islanders had little choice but to partake in kelping, despite the difficulty and the risk to health posed by the constant exposure to cold salt water and the arsenic-laden smoke.

20x30 inches. Edition of five. £250