This month we are delighted to share the first of a two-part interview between photographer Miriam Flutcher and guest SEPN writer and curator Hazel Archer.
The pair discuss Miriam’s current commission and recent exhibition ‘Childhood is Garden’ with Open Eye Gallery, and invites you to revisit your own childhood through creativity and celebrating the wonder of the everyday.
Hazel: Miriam, I loved your exhibit, it held such tangible warmth towards Garston and the people you worked with. Let’s start with the title: Childhood is a Garden. How did you arrive at this title and what does it mean to you? When you were working on this project, how did you see the metaphor of the garden playing out in your own roles as facilitator, artist, and curator?”
Miriam: The title “Childhood is a Garden” has quite a long personal history for me. I first used it as a folder name in 2022 to capture the first lot of B&W film photographs that I had developed at home. All the images were of my childhood home and hometown in Germany. Over time, I have just added any images to the folder that remind me of my own childhood. This little project was the beginning of my journey as a photographer, and it is the starting point for all my work.
When I work with communities, I want to meet people at a place where we can connect and to me that means drawing from my own experience first and offering people something that they can maybe relate to. If I am asking people to enter into an open conversation with me, I have to begin that conversation by being open and vulnerable myself.
So, I guess, working with adults and children in Garston on a project that was seeking to capture a sense of the wonder of and nostalgia for childhood, this title was always present in the back of my mind. I think I then used it in a draft for the interpretation, which I sent to the producer Sophie Mahon and she suggested it would be a fitting title for the exhibition.
The metaphorical garden to me is the place where I work. It’s where the magic and the nostalgia reside, but in the sense of facilitating collaborative projects, it is also a good metaphor for the project itself where we are all tending to, nurturing and growing together.
When it comes to collaborative practice It is a bit of a metaphor that just keeps giving, because as a facilitator you can plant the seeds, but you can’t really determine the full outcome of the project. There is a certain unpredictability to this kind of work and often the best thing you can do is support others in growing their own ideas. Especially, when working with children, who are themselves growing and need nurture and care. It helps structure the way I think about my practice.
In this particular project though the garden is not purely metaphorical, many of my conversations with the children have revolved around greenspaces, particularly their love for Garston Park.
H: All elements of your exhibit, but especially the black and white photographs taken at Garston Adventure Play that capture so much joy, remind us of the fact that the spaces we have access to as children are critical to our development. The title hints at the ideal sanctuary: a garden, enclosed but free-to-roam, cultivated yet wild. But this ideal must be under some tension when focusing on the shared public space of a neighbourhood. Did the project reshape your characterisation of Garston’s public spaces at all or prompt any ideas about how a public space could be optimized for shared, intergenerationally?
M: This is exactly what I was most curious about, when we first started working on this project. I went into this project with lots of questions. I was quite an outdoorsy child, but I didn’t grow up in an urban environment. I was interested in entering into a dialogue with the children (and adults) in Garston to find out more about what a childhood in an urban environment is like. What I have found is, that the difference isn’t as stark as I expected. As you say, the spaces we have access to as children are crucial to our development and I believe children need spaces where they are safe but at the same time don’t feel overly supervised. For the project I also interviewed with photographer Chris Isles, who grew up in Garston and whose story forms the basis of the audio in the exhibition. From his interview what transpired was that children will find their magical hideaways, their playgrounds, their “secret dens” no matter where they grow up.
Children are great place makers. Garston Adventure Play is a place that seems to allow children to take the lead, what makes it such a great space is that it does not appear to be imposing anything on the children. Instead the team offer the children lots of opportunities to explore at their own pace and leisure in a completely safe environment. I think it is a great example of after-school provision for children in an urban environment done right, not least because the parents seem to feel equally welcome at the Venny. When looking at optimizing urban spaces for living, consulting children and providing consistent funding for places like the Venny might not be such a bad idea. And we can start with ourselves, with our own childhood memories – what were our magical places? What places did we dread going to and why?
This is somewhat of a tangent, but being from Germany and speaking to children in the UK I am always baffled by how much children hate attending school. There are many reasons for this, but when I look at most English school buildings they are the most architecturally depressing places I have ever seen. I don’t know who looked at those buildings and thought ‘we really got it right this time, this is a place children will love spending half of their day in every day.’ When you take the time to listen, children will tell you exactly what they want (often it’s beanbags) and they have wonderful ideas – so why wouldn’t you consult them when designing spaces that will have a lasting impact on them?
H: Looking at the photographs (especially the “film soup” images) made me revisit a place of childlike wonder, including after I’d recently been back to my own hometown. Your work is deeply invested in paying close attention to mundane details, or being in the more open, imaginative mindset of childhood — can you suggest any other ways that we as adults can tap back into the artistic playfulness of children?
M: This is a very interesting question. I recently listened to a BBC4 podcast about witches, but the first episode just began by looking at everyday magic and wonder and the way that childhood feels very magical (it instantly got me hooked on the podcast!). I think as an adult, it is important not to lose that sense of magic. The podcast cited some research showing that people’s experiences of ‘awe’ mostly happen in nature. This is true for me and one way to make sure I give myself time for those experiences is taking my camera with me and focusing in on the details. I also give myself permission to get excited about the little things. I love feeding the ducks in Sefton Park and I allow myself to get really excited about it. I also like revisiting hobbies that I had as a child and I think it’s important to remember that you don’t have to have children around to revisit things that you enjoyed as a child. The same goes for traditions and rituals. When I was living in a shared house just after university, I made my housemates participate in the German tradition of St. Nick’s day. On the night before the 6th of December, German children clean their boots and put them by the door. In the night St. Nick fills the boots with fruits, nuts, chocolates and sometimes presents. My housemates cleaned their boots and the next day they were magically filled with chocolates and tangerines. It’s silly, of course, but it’s fun.
I think a lot of the time adults struggle with recreation. Children don’t. Recreational activities for adults include: watching TV, taking a bath, going drinking, meeting people for coffee, running… Most children aren’t allowed to watch as much TV as they want to, so they have to get creative to pass the time. As an adult boredom is a luxury, but I also think it’s an essential ingredient of creativity. So, maybe don’t turn the TV on or go on your phone, let yourself be bored, let your mind wander. Meet your friends for an afternoon of crafting. Do an activity without purpose. Re-visit things that brought you joy as a child.
This is the end of the part one of the interview with Miriam. We will be releasing the second half in December, but for now we hope you find some inner childhood Joy with the rest of your day.
Text: Hazel Archer
Images: Rob Battersby
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