Get together and get things done
Poster
1984 (made)
1984 (made)
| Artist/Maker | |
| Place of origin |
Portrait poster advertising the Tower Hamlets Federation of Tenants. The poster shows a black and white photograph of a crowd of people with their backs to the camera, looking at an black of flats. A paintbrush creates a curved line across the poster, and picks features out in the primary colours of blue, red and yellow.
Object details
| Categories | |
| Object type | |
| Title | Get together and get things done (generic title) |
| Materials and techniques | Photostencil, printing, paper, plastic laminate |
| Brief description | Poster, designed by Tony Minnion and produced by Tower Hamlets Tenants Assoociation with the Basement Community Arts Workshop, London, 1984. |
| Physical description | Portrait poster advertising the Tower Hamlets Federation of Tenants. The poster shows a black and white photograph of a crowd of people with their backs to the camera, looking at an black of flats. A paintbrush creates a curved line across the poster, and picks features out in the primary colours of blue, red and yellow. |
| Dimensions |
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| Marks and inscriptions |
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| Credit line | Given by the Greenwich Mural Workshop. |
| Object history | Poster featured in the Greenwich Mural Workshop's 1986 exhibition 'Printing is Easy...?' |
| Bibliographic reference | From the exhibition by the Greenwich Mural Workshop 'Printing is Easy...?', 1986
Transcript of conversation between Tony Minnion and Benjamin Selig on 1 March 2023:
Tony Minnion 0:21
I'm actually I moved out of London 20 years ago, I live in Cornwall now.
So I but I still work as a as a community artists, which is essentially what I was doing when that poster was created.
It was as part of my first job after leaving college.
Benjamin Selig 0:48
Right. Okay.
Tony Minnion 0:51
And, yeah, and I've worked my whole life as, as a community based artist. And I'm very much in in this. And
Benjamin Selig 1:09
so were you were you quite heavily affiliated with basement community arts, were you just on this project,
Tony Minnion 1:16
what happened was I I had a studio in Limehouse. In an old factory, and I was really interested in power artists integrated into established working class or communities. That was, you know, whopping grown up on it was growing up at the time and it, it just wasn't integrating. It was just taking the cheap spaces. And so I was quite politically motivated at that point to, to find how myself as an artist can be useful in the community. And I ended up joining a group called the Doppler community poster project. Okay. And that was based in on the Isle of Dogs, and it was just at the point when Hessel time was transforming documents from, you know, because the dots are moved DESE. Yeah. The whole area was seen in on the auditoriums and to some extent in Nero was seen as a blank canvas for developers. Yeah, yeah. And what I got involved with a group that were GLC sponsored because it was at the height of government, Batchelor government on one side and Ken Livingstone on the other. So it was a political divide. GLC was sponsoring arts projects that addressed social issues, and we, we were set up, the project was set up by two artists called Pete on the marine Lisa. And they got me into work for them printing screen printing posters. So we were what we were doing was affiliating ourselves with local pressure groups and community groups and tenants groups to Trump sure that the voices of local people were considered in the redevelopment.
Benjamin Selig 3:31
Okay. Okay. Right. And so, so in in that, how, how did that kind of come about who was involved in this in this poster? Was that just kind of you as community artists, or so the people who were
Tony Minnion 3:48
basically because we were, we were linking with the Tower Hamlets Federation of tenants association with the group, I think that initiated that poster. Robert rates like the Greenland dock Action Group, which was about saving jobs in dodgeland areas. There was a joint document action group there was, you can imagine, there was a lot of different groups fighting to try and ensure they got their voice heard. And as part of that, the basement Arts Project was it was a community based screen printing an art project. It did grow, printing and printing. And then he actually had they had an alternate as a sort of alternative school there as well for people who are betting on in the mainstream educated. So that was kind of the sort of thing that existed and I see in the early 80s into A community based arts project. So we will linked with one another, we think to each other in the woman who ran the screen printing resource at the basement, shared my studio as well. So we we work together on on a number of different projects.
Benjamin Selig 5:23
Was this produced at your studio or was this?
Tony Minnion 5:27
Yeah it was, I think that poster was printed at the baseline. Okay. Because by then, because she'd moved to the basement. There was no point in paying rent to run a screen. What we were doing was community based. So we we, we I did my screen printing there. But I was also linked with we used to the artists that I worked with with the docklands campaign. We're hiring huge billboards and doing they're quite, they got quite well known for doing it, but they were doing big billboards trying to give a voice to the local peak, right.
Benjamin Selig 6:11
Was this initially a big billboard or was it proposed for that or was it was a poster printed to go on Tower Hamlets poster boards?
Tony Minnion 6:24
Okay, the town council, the sorry, the Borough Council, were committed to giving tenants a voice so they supported I mean, they were quite a they were quite a radical Town Council as Borough Council. Sorry, if you can tell I've lived in Cornwall. All the councils are town councillors. But the Borough Council a town that's para was quite it was really committed to bringing in tenants voices. So the tenants the Federation of tenants associations met, I went to a meeting. They said we want we've been given these, the council we're going to pay for and distribute these posters all around the estates, all around Tower Hamlets trying to encourage people to to get involved in transforming their estates and being being more proactive. Yeah. You know, as in tenants groups. Okay, great. So that's, so they met with me as a representative and the doctrine, community posted project because and and then we went to the basement. And I worked with them to design the poster.
Benjamin Selig 7:49
Okay, great, because yeah, from the research that we've got there as there's no understanding on our side, but you know, these posters were distributed on mass. They appear to be singular posters that have been produced for one campaign. So that's really interesting.
Tony Minnion 8:08
Yeah. No, it was funny. Not en-masse. It was it was good for a community. Oh, yeah. We would have printed to the council and as well as their posters, which were going up saying, don't drop litter and, you know, whatever. Yeah. They were putting these posters up in in the around the notice boards around Tower Hamlets, so they got they got quite well distributed.
Benjamin Selig 8:43
Okay, cool. And the actual design of the poster itself, are you able to expand a bit on that?
Tony Minnion 8:54
Yeah, I've got the hardware I've got the poster if I had to look at it yesterday. You know, I was I was in my early 20s.
But it was a while what I did, as as being part of the Dockland community poster project, they, we did a lot of photos, we photographed a lot of demonstrations, gatherings, and community events. So we the photos used in it, were from will collage and montage. From photos of tenants gathering. I can't remember what it was now. It might have been protesting about rent increases or whatever it was, you know, there was so we had a whole archive Have people in a community groups? Sure, sure. So basically, in those days, the technology, as you can imagine, was fairly different. The question of printing the photos, and that a number of different photos onto film, and then cutting them up. And, and collaging it together.
Benjamin Selig 10:30
And were they were the people involved in that making? Would that the design as well, was that primarily you or whatever kind of other volunteers, kind of other artists?
Tony Minnion 10:43
I was commissioned to do it. Okay. And then I remember doing some sketches I had, I think I had the idea of a paintbrush sweeping through. Yeah, that was a good idea at the time,
Benjamin Selig 11:00
and what was the kind of idea behind the paint brush sweeping through?
Tony Minnion 11:09
Well, it was sort of transforming a, a fairly black and white and colourless environment into one colour. It was it was very bright. It was brightening it up at transit. It was about transforming place where people lived. And I think I would have had a few different design ideas. And I remember going to a tenants meeting, which was, and they had representatives from a number of different states like the burden. I can't remember the names of them all now. And they sort of looked at my designs and said, we'll have that one
Benjamin Selig 11:55
Okay, were you were you kind of involved in the campaign in a way outside of the poster?
Tony Minnion 12:07
Yeah. I mean, I was involved because of the docklands community poster project, worked across New Tower Hamlets.I was involved in as an artist in a lot of different I had to take my camera to a lot of different demonstrations, but also we initiated some, some different community. It's a community action. Like I think there was a Docklands Armada where we hired boats, put loads of local people in them. And it was all done in partnership with like, yeah. And then we failed up to Westminster with huge banners and stood stood up in the boats and wave them around. I mean, it was it was it was quite, there was a lot of action going on. Yeah, there's a lot of stuff going on then. Particularly the basement Arts Project was very tied up with the Bengali population that was establishing itself in, in the area at the time and supporting them. And there was, and it also was at the point where the National Front where it would been quite active. You know, it was so it was kind of it was quite a dynamic time. I mean, I don't know if you know, the basement. Where the basement Arts Project was, it was in the old Stepney Yeah. In Cable Street, in the old dirt Hall. And it was a huge mural of the Cable Street uprising. On the site. Oh,
Benjamin Selig 14:00
yeah. When they marched through this, this
Tony Minnion 14:04
Yeah. When the Fascists were, yeah. In the police and the fascists. It was, I don't know why history is rubbish. But it was it would have been one postwar would it was it pre war? I think it was pre war, because it was when a Mosley was around. Okay. So it was very it was just when the Fascists were rising in the late 40s. But it was a huge mobilisation of people to stop the fascist taking over cables, the stent. Anyway, that's a bit of a sidetrack.
Benjamin Selig 14:49
There vary. Yeah, it's quite relevant though, because it gives some context to you know, Stepney green as an area that you know, didn't You know, all of this activism didn't just come about in the 70s and 80s. So I think it is important. And, you know, that's part of what the kind of multiple voices that we're trying to tell them their story, you know, doesn't all just come about out of thin air, you know, these are the kind of legacies that have contended decades.
Tony Minnion 15:24
Yeah. And actually, those areas like, because they don't lend areas, they had some of the early settlers, earliest settlements of us or Chinese communities and, and, of course, huge Jewish community and commercial, round and around there. I mean, it's multicultural, and it was one of the first parts of London to really establish itself. City but the, the poster itself, get together and get things done. I don't know if you know that. That a few. In 2018. It was lent to Manchester art gallery. Do you know about what?
Benjamin Selig 16:13
Yeah, I do recall.
Tony Minnion 16:15
Because they, and they used it as the inspiration for the design, and the title of an exhibition that they had called get together and get things done, which was an exhibition celebrating. Celebrating activism, people. It was, it was around, it was 2018. So it was when a lot of the ecology movement was getting mobilised on social media. And the and in extinction, rebellion was getting established, black lives matter was happening. And so they, they put an Arctic an exhibition on celebrating different different contemporary moves towards people getting together and getting things done. And then they use the poster itself. They use the typography and the design. Yeah, and the whole exhibition, which was lovely, you know, it was nice for me. Can my ego for a minute, but you know, it was, but it was great that it had that secondary use, you know, yeah, that it went out of the museum, and actually sort of inspired something up there, but it was, apparently it was quite well attended the exhibition.
Benjamin Selig 17:54
I mean, it's really, you know, it's a really inspiring period of time. A lot of my work has been, you know, looking into the kind of demolition and regeneration of, you know, the docklands projects in light of what's kind of going on in Stratford at the moment. And, you know, trying to create a conversation with local audiences, and, you know, situating kind of VNA among that, given that with it and heard about, you know, what's what's kind of going on in the local area? And how that, you know, reflects on kind of wider attitudes towards regeneration, redevelopment. Yeah, so, you know, it's really, really interesting talking to you and completely irrelevant, you know, the stuff with Manchester Art Gallery displaying and kind of also being inspired by the get together and get things done.
Tony Minnion 18:57
Yeah. I mean, there was I did take some photos of a few other posters. We did at the time, that I can send you Ben if you like.
Benjamin Selig 19:12
That would be amazing.
Tony Minnion 19:15
A no airport in new poster. Right. And then I look at them all, I think, Oh, well. Yeah. Originally, I've never flown from them myself. But But, um, and there's, you know, there's. So that was new and based. And there was there's another one I did for the Tower Hamlets empty properties group, which was a campaign group. Working on filling the empty property together is massive. At that time, the council would really let the public housing sector Stop trying to ruin
Benjamin Selig 20:01
Yeah. Yeah. Did you feel like you were affecting kind of policy?
Tony Minnion 20:20
It was a difficult time. I mean, to be honest, it's not dissimilar to now in that there was a real polarisation because especially within London because you had a left leaning JLC which was really quite radical and replace it as an hour. The the sort of support it gave for community or politically motivated artists was was was remarkable contemporary, what happened. But obviously, he also had a very powerful tool recoverable goblin.
Benjamin Selig 21:05
Yeah.
Tony Minnion 21:08
I mean, my experience of growing up then was just being you fight and not fighting, literally, but being out in the streets every every weekend sort of trying to stop this
Benjamin Selig 21:25
this bulldozer
Tony Minnion 21:30
this bulldoze sort of sweeping through wood. And looking back at it retrospectively, it was hugely transformative time in terms I mean, the miners strike was happening at the time. So they were just you know, they were destroying the unions, left, right and centre and, and, and also what happened in Stratford and New England and Tower Hamlets. And they basically developers are just it's like they thought they discovered this empty canvas. Yeah. The people who lived there didn't matter. But I mean, if you imagine it in Docklands terms, of course, it was all about seaside. Sorry, Riverside views. You know, it was all about Riverside development. Yeah, I remember we were in this. We worked at one point in, in the Custom House on the entrance to the eyelid dock, which was really rough around there. The rest of it was a huge sort of brown field full of posts and bulldozers and dozers and surveyors, and then somebody turned up and said, Oh, they're gonna bring Bill Chicago banks are gonna go up this tower block, it's called Canary Wharf, and it's gonna be just there and we will look desolate. I'm thinking now about what's going to happen. But I mean, it almost we always blinked and it happened. Fast. Yeah. Because it was International. Finance, just prepared with governments just transforming a region. Yeah. And yet the people who live there were, you know, there. They, they'd only recently been put out of work as botlane work as darkness. Yeah.
Benjamin Selig 23:26
Yeah, completely. It's quite, you know, it's really startling. Especially kind of watching live footage of the time, when you're seeing the juxtaposition between this kind of new development people in estates that have been abandoned and really kind of cut out and looming presence that takes away any sunlight, and dustfilling the screen.
Tony Minnion 23:59
Like, I remember in on the other dogs, there was this this tenement block, which, you know, was really rundown, but you could, it was on the river edge. We thought it was on the river edge, knock it down. They just bought this massive block of flats between the terminal block and the river. So suddenly they're only view was sort of looking at this incredible, these incredible apartments that was so beyond any anybody's you know, means to own. And also very quickly, people moved in and there was just total separation.
It was very, it was very strange. There's still evidence of it now. Isn't that really?
Benjamin Selig 24:55
Tower Hamlets, is one of the most impoverished areas of London. Tower Hamlets and Newham had the highest levels of child poverty in the UK. And, you know, they're on the backs of the Docklands. They're not the Isle of Dogs itself. But yeah, it's completely extreme. And it's done very little to consider the local community. You know, that's, that was not their intention.
Tony Minnion 25:33
It was quite remarkable the the powers that the developers are given by the London development corporate. Yeah. Because it was basically I mean, we see we saw with what, what this government has done very recently, and just tearing up planning, you know, just opening the door for the planet. You know, but it was it was those ever called enterprise zones weren't like they did in Liverpool as well. It was very much. Yeah. It's the same old,
Benjamin Selig 26:15
Yeah, it's very, very bleak. Yeah, but, you know, back to the poster. You know, thanks so much for enlightening me giving me way more information that we had on it, you know, that's really, really useful. Great to understand the Docklands Community Poster Project as well, which we didn't know.
Tony Minnion 26:43
You know, I didn't get involved in on that side of the docklands community poster project there is there's an awful lot about that online. And they were they were very active. We had I think we had a poster site in Stratford on this circus on the you know, the one way system the artists who will peek down on the rain Leeson. But it was quite an interesting project. I mean, I'd sort of leave it to them to tell you about it or for you to find out online. It I mean, looking back on it. There was a lot of fuss about the amount of funding given to the arts to the docklands community poster project. But it was just, you know, it was a drop in the ocean compared to that sort of money that was switching swirling around. Yeah. What should I do with these posts? I photograph the posters I've got. One of them was designed by Lorraine Leeson, who was one of the artists in the project. And she's and that I, I, I'll send you the files. And they just, I mean, they're just quick photos I've taken off them.
Benjamin Selig 28:15
That would be Yeah, I mean, that'd be really useful just from the kind of curatorial research side to get some kind of photographic research really, alongside, you know, some of the some of the other things that were going on. Could be really useful. Thank you. Yeah. I mean,
Tony Minnion 28:34
I've got a couple of copies of them, but my only copies. I'll keep those for nostalgic reasons, to give to my grandchildren, you know?
Benjamin Selig 28:49
Yeah, you keep those for yourself.
Tony Minnion 28:54
Yeah, I'll email them through to you then, Ben, and you can do what you like with them. Great.
Benjamin Selig 29:04
Thanks so much.
Tony Minnion 29:05
In terms of just I'm just conscious that the one which is no airport in Newham, I don't have the rights for that. It's a Docklands community project. They're all Docklands Community Poster Project posters. I was I was their printer and a practical worker. I used to put the posters up for them.
Benjamin Selig 29:31
When you were doing that, were you working on your own or were there other artists working on the poster?
Tony Minnion 29:46
The main body of work for the docklands community poster project was these great big billboards. Yeah, that were huge. And they used to buy advertising billboards, and they had they had designs that changed every couple of weeks. They sort of grew like for example, the first one they started was called Big Money's Moving In, and there was a big corrugated fence, and then every week, a panel of the fence came off and behind it, there was just piles of money. But they looked like tower blocks. Okay, so it was very much very black and white photo montage in the sort of Heartland trip John Hartfield tradition. And my job was to stick them all on bits of plywood, take the ladders out climb the ladders and unscrew the parts and change. But the two artists who did it, you know, they, they sort of got quite a name for themselves doing it as a piece of work. And if you if you Google Dunn and Leeson you'll see what they got up to. So my work was printing the smaller scale in response to local campaigns. And I was sort of 22 at the time, right? You know, doing it part time. So you know, I was the skivvy on the job, doing the work.
Benjamin Selig 31:37
Doing the hard labour.
Tony Minnion 31:39
Yeah, the hard graft. But you know, it was a nice job. I learnt an awful lot.
Benjamin Selig 31:48
How long were you involved?
Tony Minnion 31:48
I did it for 3 years, because I lived in Camden, and Camden opened up a screen-printing resource down in Rosebury Avenue, again to provide printing to local people. It was just before Zerox took off. So if you wanted to say, 'stop driving your cars through our little back streeets' you'd come along and spend two days printing a poster about it, and you'd go and put them up. But, a few years later, the technology had been left behind. People just do A3 photocopies. But I then went off. I carried on screenprinting, I did textiles and banners.
So I was very involved in Docklands, two years before I got the job with them and then 3 years after. |
| Collection | |
| Accession number | E.571.2013 |
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| Record created | November 20, 2013 |
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