It's often said – particularly in working ports – that anyone can cook a fish but it takes a certain sort of individual to catch one.
Those who have spent even a few hours on a trawler, long-liner or tosher will testify that men – and very occasionally women – who choose to spend their working lives catching our tea are a rare breed.
For many, watching the trials of North East crews taking part the recent television series Trawlerman, was enough to make them feel a bit queasy. And the seas of the Western Approaches are no less difficult or dangerous. Still the most perilous peacetime occupation, commercial fishing is not for the faint-hearted. Yet despite this knowledge, how many of us think twice about the true price of fish when frying up a fillet of plaice or popping out to the chippy?
In recent years much focus has been placed on the Rick Steins, Nathan Outlaws and other celebrity chefs who cook the fish, while those at the cod-end of the trawl tend to be ignored. However, one person determined to celebrate and pay tribute to the hardship – and all-too frequent sacrifice – of today's crews is artist Bridget Keen. Having grown up on the Isles of Scilly, she has lived among fishermen for most of her life, observing their life at close quarters.
After a few years in Devon and London, she and husband Michael moved to Penzance, where Bridget became reacquainted with the fishing community at Newlyn. Inspired, in part, by the work of Stanhope Forbes, Harold Harvey, Henry Scott Tuke and other members of the famous 19th century school of painting, she realised the importance of recording the lives of today's fishing community.
Unflinching in her approach to realism, Bridget is not interested in romanticism, instead aiming to portray port life as it is in the first decade of the 21st century. Consequently, her forthcoming exhibition of acrylics on board at the Royal Cornwall Museum in Truro is aptly titled Fish, Grit And Guts. And as well as the fishermen themselves, the dozen or so paintings tackle subjects ranging from the breaking-up of decommissioned trawlers to seagulls pecking at heads and frames on the shore, brimming red plastic baskets on the market to a Turner-esque study of The Feasible, a former Lowestoft drifter built in 1919 and once well-known in Cornish waters. Bridget's work, which had its first outing at The Centre in Newlyn, shows the port as it is today: workaday and bustling, men at sea and on the quay, catching and landing fish destined for tables at home and abroad.
In 4 Knots, a crewman is portrayed as hero, hunter, stripped to the waist like a warrior. In Trawlerman, he is dressed in the ubiquitous checked shirt, while in Dog, an array of plastic, metal and other rubbish routinely washed up on our shores is a comment on how the sea has become a dumping ground.
"The paintings were created out of a desire to record, in paint and in accurate detail, the current Newlyn scene and in particular because of the changes taking place there," said Bridget. "The information found in them has largely been obtained by drawing and painting from life a range of objects and creatures I have brought back from Newlyn to work on in my studio. I also spent many hours sketching and drawing on the shoreline and quayside.
"Draftsmanship and composition are key elements for me. Each painting has been carefully constructed to juxtapose different components – fish, man, net, chain and rope – often with one being superimposed in great detail over another to create depth and clarity.
"I honestly feel more at ease with fishermen than I do with artists – probably because, having sailed all my life, I understand a little of their experience of the sea. And I hope that empathy comes through in the work."
article copyright THE CORNISHMAN