Seacoal

Photographs made at Lynemouth from 1976 to 1984

“When I first saw the beach at Lynemouth in January 1976, I recognized the industry above it but nothing else. The beach beneath me was full of activity with horses and carts backed into the sea. Men were standing in the sea next to the carts, using small wire nets attached to poles to fish out coal from the water beneath them. The place confounded time; here the Middle Ages and the twentieth century intertwined.”