Don McCullin retrospective heading for Tate Liverpool
A major retrospective of work by celebrated British war photographer Sir Don McCullin is finally coming to Tate Liverpool this month.
What was due to be The Royal Albert Dock gallery’s 2020 summer blockbuster exhibition - until the Coronavirus pandemic struck - will feature more than 250 fascinating photographs by the 83-year-old Londoner.
It follows the success of the show when it was staged at Tate Britain in spring 2019.
Tate Liverpool bosses say the show will include additional photographs that photojournalist McCullin took of Liverpool and other northern towns and cities in the 1960s and 70s and which were not shown at the Millbank exhibition.
McCullin said: “I first visited Liverpool as a boy of 15 when I worked on a steam train that went into the city three or four times a week. As a young man I returned as a photojournalist.
Above: Don McCullin Liverpool 8 Neighbourhood, Liverpool c1970 © Don McCullin
Top: Don McCullin Protester, Cuban Missile Crisis, Whitehall, London 1962 © Don McCullin
“I spent time with artists and poets including Adrian Henri and Brian Patten for a Telegraph Magazine story written by Roger McGough; documented the police for The Sunday Times in the 1970s and collaborated with Jonathan Miller on an assignment for The Observer.
“It was a unique city but felt familiar to me as someone who grew up in an area that was also left impoverished by policies of deindustrialisation.
“I’m delighted to be showing my work at Tate Liverpool and to have the opportunity to return to the city, a place I love and has played a major part in my life and career."
The exhibition will showcase some of McCullin’s most potent and moving photographs captured over the last 60 years, including many of his iconic war photographs – with images from Vietnam, Northern Ireland and more recently Syria.
It will also focus on the work he did here at home, recording scenes of poverty and working-class life in the industrial north and London’s East End, as well as meditative landscapes of his beloved Somerset, where he lives.
Alongside McCullin’s hand-printed silver gelatin prints, the exhibition also includes the photographer’s magazine spreads, contact sheets, his helmet and the Nikon camera which took a bullet for him in Cambodia.
Tate Liverpool director Helen Legge said: “The public and critical response to the exhibition at Tate Britain was overwhelmingly positive and we’re thrilled to be bringing this large-scale show to Liverpool.”
Don McCullin is at Tate Liverpool from September 16 2020 to May 9 2021. Timed tickets HERE
Pic above: Don McCullin Shell-shocked US Marine, The Battle of Hue1968, printed 2013 ARTIST ROOMS Tate and National Galleries of Scotland. Presented by the artist 2014 © Don McCullin