I moved to the small market town of Driffield in 2003. Situated among the beautiful rolling chalk hills of the Yorkshire Wolds it is just a short drive to the coast and the cold North Sea. Looking around for a subject to photograph it was the local wildlife that first caught my attention and for more than ten years I found myself obsessed with capturing the local fauna through my long lens.
Ten years later, I bought a used Leica Monochrom together with a 35mm Summilux FLE and began to explore the streets and harbours of my local coastal towns. Having spent many years developing and processing film in a community darkroom, photographing the world with a digital monochrome camera was a revelation! (converting a digital RGB file always seemed like cheating to me). After a couple of years, I discovered that I much preferred photographing around dawn when the streets are empty, except for a few dog-walkers and local traders.
A few years later I began photographing in colour using Leica lenses and cameras. I found photographing in colour to be hugely difficult and it took me many months to acquire no more than an appreciation of colour and composition. Today, I still use both colour and monochrome cameras on my daily trips to the Yorkshire coast.
The sea-side resorts of Whitby, Scarborough and Filey became very popular during the mid 19th century. Thousands of factory workers from the industrial cities of West Yorkshire and beyond would be transported by the newly developed railways to the small hotels and boarding houses for their annual summer holiday. The rich folk would stay at the luxury hotels such as the imposing 'The Grand Hotel' in Scarborough, which was built in 1860 and was at the time, the largest brick-built hotel in Europe.
Today, these coastal resorts are struggling to entice holiday-makers. Inadequate and poorly maintained infrastructure and competition from cheap foreign holidays has brought about an inevitable decline in visitor numbers. Yet despite this these communities continue to survive.
As a photographer, I continue to be fascinated by the small details that represent to me the existential struggle of these coastal communities. Some of the smaller villages have already become ghost towns during the winter season with many of the pretty cottages being bought as second-homes by the wealthy. The once mighty fishing fleets of Bridlington and Scarborough have been decimated with only a few boats still remaining active. But life goes on...
I hope that you enjoy looking at a small selection of my photographs in these galleries. Perhaps some of them will bring back some happy childhood memories for you? If so, please drop me a line.
Tony McLean —April 2022