PHIL MAXWELL

Today is International Women’s day. These photographs celebrate women the world over. I hope they challenge the idea that progress is largely brought about by men. We still have a long way to go before injustice based purely on a persons sex is eradicated. Each year new photographs are added to this International Women’s day blog.

Bangladesh 1992

Women in Liverpool 8, 1981

Photomontage 2013

Workers on strike, East London c.1988

Women in launderette, Liverpool 1980

Bangladesh 2008

Women against Racism, London 1992

Protester at anti nuclear rally. Brighton sea front early 1980's

East London 2010

Trade Union banner at the TUC anti Racist Demo. Spitalfields 1994

Woman preparing herbs & spices in a village outside Dhaka, 1992

Pat, stallholder at the Bethnal Green Road market, 1992

Belle protesting with others outside a BNP election meeting, John Scurr School 1986

Belle is addressing the anti racist demonstrators standing outside the school in front of her.

Andrea addressing the BNP who were inside the school, 1986

The police ensured that the BNP were allowed into the school hall. School children had produced their own exhibition on the life and story of Anne Frank. This was damaged by BNP members.

Protesters against estate sales march down Cambridge Heath Road, 1984

A dance performance at the Spitalfields Community Festival. Spitalfields market, 1997

The London based American composer Lola Perrin, 2009

Lola works closely with Hazuan Hashim and Phil Maxwell and has composed the music for their latest silent film Going East.

Portrait of a centenerian woman, Sylhet, Bangladesh 1992

Women protestors outside the former Bethnal Green Town Hall, 1984

Whitechapel 2011

These two women were lobbying the then Liberal Council in Tower Hamlets against cuts in Council services.

Demonstrators against war in Iraq, 2003

Over a million people demonstrated on the streets of London to voice their opposition to military action against Iraq . There were also anti-war gatherings in Glasgow and Belfast – all part of a worldwide weekend of protest with hundreds of rallies and marches in up to 60 countries.The demonstration ended in Hyde Park where demonstrators listened to speakers from around the world. Women speakers included former minister Mo Mowlem, Vanessa Redgrave and Bianca Jagger. Playwright Harold Pinter made a rare public speech, saying America was “a country run by a bunch of criminal lunatics with Tony Blair as a hired Christian thug”.

Anti fascist protester, 1995

Unison Shop Steward Sarah Jane, 2010

Whitechapel 2013

Nurse Louige, 2010

Two women anti racist protesters, 1988

Three women at the TUC anti racist demonstration, 1994

Lone young woman anti racist protester, 1994

Women workers in a tea garden, Sylhet, Bangladesh 1992

Sandra Esqulant, 2008

Hazuan Hashim and myself made a film about Sandra.  Intended as a portrait of London’s East End through the eyes of pub landlady, Sandra Esqulant who has been running the Golden Heart pub for over 30 years. Adored by everyone around her, the film captures a slice of her life in and outside the pub she has run continuously for over 25 years in the East End of London. Listed as one of the most influential figures in the art world, her wit, warmth and eccentricity leap out of the screen. Sandra’s affectionate recollections of the old and new East End are realized through archive photography, which captures the changes in and around Spitalfields over recent decades. You can watch the entire film here.