Martin Seeds Artist Photographer

‘Assembly’ is a body of work in six parts, that is set in the Stormont Estate, the home of the Northern Ireland Assembly. The work uses the power of photography to generate allegory - letting the plants, trees and foliage deliver a message from the grounds surrounding the Northern Ireland parliament building about the struggles embedded in a fragile political landscape.

‘Assembly’ suggests the importance of the grounds as a common material space beyond culture in which difference and likeness are both articulated and intertwined in a natural world outside of the political chamber. View Assembly text
All work 2016

Assembly i. Architectural plans of the Northern Ireland Parliament building at Stormont.
Giclée. Crown Copyright, used with permission.

Assembly v, 101x76 cms, c-type, in red artist frame.
Assembly iv, 36 b&w contact prints of plant fragments from the Stormont Estate,
7.6x5 cms image on 30x24 cms paper, silver gelatin fibre based hand prints.
Assembly iii, 101 x76cms, archival progment print in white artist frame.
Installation at University of Brighton Gallery, Brighton, UK 2016

Assembly iv. 36 b&w contact prints of plant fragments from the Stormont Estate.
7.6x5 cms image on 30x24 cms paper, silver gelatin fibre based hand prints.

Assembly v. 101x76 cms, c-type

from Assembly vi. 30 pairs of photographs made in the grounds of the Stormont Estate.
55.6x40.6 cms, archival pigment prints, 2016.

Assembly vi. 30 pairs of landscape photographs made in the grounds of the Stormont Estate.
Site specific video installation. 1080p HD, no sound.
Installed at The Regency Town House, Brighton, as part of Brighton Photo Fringe, 2016.

from Assembly vi. 30 pairs of photographs made in the grounds of the Stormont Estate.
55.6x40.6 cms, archival pigment prints, 2016.
Installation at Centre Culturel Irlandais, Paris 2017

Assembly v. 101x76 cms, c-type, with matching red artist frame.
3 pairs of photographs from Assembly vi. 40.6 x30 cms, archival pigment prints.
Installation at Centre Culturel Irlandais, Paris, France 2017

Assembly iii. Fragments of fossilized material in the Portland stone façade of the Parliament building.
101 x76cms, archival progment print in white artist frame.
Installation at University of Brighton Gallery, Brighton, UK 2016

Assembly i. Architectural plans of the Northern Ireland Parliament building at Stormont.
archival pigment print. Crown Copyright, used with permission

from Assembly vi. 55.6x40.6 cms and 40.6x30 cms, archival pigment prints
Installation at University of Brighton Gallery, Brighton, UK 2016.

from Assembly vi. 40.6x30 cms, archival pigment prints
Installation at Centre Culturel Irlandais, Paris 2017

Assembly v. 101x76 cms, c-type, with red artist frame.
Assembly vi. 40.6x30 cms and 55.6x40.6 cms. archival prigment prints
Assembly iv grid of 36 contact prints of plant fragments. 7.6x5 cms on 30 x 24 cms paper, silver gelatin fibre based hand prints
Installation at Centre Culturel Irlandais, Paris 2017

Addendum: Martin Seeds July 2018.

When I started making this work in late 2015 there was an optimism about the future of the Assembly. Perhaps this was due to the Fresh Start Agreement in November that year that re-energised the political landscape. However a few months after this work was finished and exhibited in 2016 the Northern Ireland Assembly collapsed.

Initially the financial mishandling of an environmental heating scheme was the source of the impasse between the two main political parties. In a short period of time old tribal grievances emerged and became woven into arguments between the parties about who was responsible. The disagreements have been so deep that the viability of the Good Friday Agreement as a framework for governance is being questioned.

In 2018 the twenty year anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement passed uneventfully and the Assembly borne from it was silent and empty. The prospect of a future Assembly has been twisted by and into the outcome of BREXIT.