SUBJECT TO DISRUPTION
ASPEX PORTSMOUTH
2026
As a continuation of my project Stories From the Bishopsgate Archive, for this exhibition at Aspex Portsmouth, I wanted to focus further on my research on The Wapping Dispute, which I find most acutely relevant to our times.
The Wapping Dispute happened when Rupert Murdoch allegedly fired 6000 print-workers by making them go on strike, so he could fire them without severance, when he became able to build a new technologically advanced printing plant. This case is considered by many as an important fight which had been lost by the unions, causing their incremental decrease in power since. It is a perfect example for why it is important to find ways to come together and fight for our rights, as technological advancements shouldn’t only benefit employers.
Pondering further on the letterpress trade, I also kept wondering what, if anything, have we lost in the process of this technological advancement, and what would it mean if publications were still made by hand. Something noticeable in the archive is just how much for vile the language in Murdoch's newspapers became once letters were no longer composed by hand, by print workers. Clearly, we firstly lose the right to collectively oppose publishing a particular message.
I also wondered to what extent the meaning and integrity of our words is lost when today we communicate so quickly and easily to a wide public, and each one of us acts as a publisher. Also, what would it have meant if print workers jobs would have simply been repurposed, into still producing high quality publications by hand, perhaps with more authorship over the process, and how many more unique artefacts would have been produced by now.
With this in mind, I made my first larger woodcut print, illustrating the well known poem by Beatrice Warde, which stood outside many printing offices around the world:
This is a Printing-office
Crossroads of civilization
Refuge of all the arts
Against the ravages of time
Armory of the fearless truth
Against whispering rumor
Incessant trumpet of trade
From this place words may fly abroad
Not to perish on waves of sound
Not to vary with the writer’s hand
But fixed in time having been verified in proof
Friend you stand on the sacred ground:
This is a Printing-office
To carry on thinking about these themes, I also had a small letterpress galley in the show, which had a few sentences composed from the traditional lead type on it. I printed a few hundreds of these small reminders for the public to take with them, and the gallery was there for them to see how they were made.
I also invited the public to participate in a few workshops where they could make their own small reminders, and thus the displayed galley became a living sculpture throughout the show, with changing sentences throughout. You can see the documentation of those workshops here.
A continuation of my research on The Wapping Dispute
