
A Year in the Life of Chew Stoke Village
- Publisher
- RRB Photobooks & Martin Parr Foundation
- Year
- 2022
- ISBN
- 9781838268374
- Specifications
- Hardcover
First Edition
84 pages
Standard and Special Editions
Over 40 previously unpublished images
New text by Diane Smyth
Special edition includes two signed prints
A Year in the Life of Chew Stoke Village is the culmination of a yearlong project in which Martin Parr immersed himself in the goings-on of a rural Somerset village on the outskirts of Bristol. At the time of the original project house prices across the country had fallen sharply and young people were struggling to afford to stay in the village; the influx of newcomers brought slight tensions across the community. Through the colourful summer fêtes, the nights spent drinking at the local pub, and the many celebrations in between, Parr built connections with the villagers, gaining access to all the village events over the year and an understanding of the people who live there. This new collaboration between RRB Photobooks and the Martin Parr Foundation is lavishly printed and includes over forty previously unpublished images from the project, alongside a new text by Diane Smyth that situates the work both as documentary practice and as a piece of Parr's long, varied and inquisitive career. The book brings out the colour, the comedy and the small social knots of an English village seen from inside its calendar of public occasions.