An exhibition showcasing Josef Herman’s rapidly executed, expressionist sketches of miners, land workers and fisher folk successfully opened last Saturday at Pontardawe Arts Centre. Town Mayor Councillor Bob Williams officially opened the exhibition with a heart-felt speech saying that he could sense Josef’s presence in each of the works around him.
‘Llafur – Imaging the Labourer’ is an insightful exhibition celebrating the labourers that Josef Herman encountered during his travels around the world, this includes the collier – who he held in deep regard. “It would be true to say that the miner is the walking monument to labour” – so concluded the artist Josef Herman, the centenary of whose birth we celebrate in 2011.
“The miner is the man of Ystradgynlais” Herman wrote, seeing in him “the pride of human labour and the calm force which promises to guard its dignity”. He continued: “amid the clean figures of the shop-keepers, the tall and thin figures of the town councillors, the robust figures of the insurance agents, the respectable figures of the ministers, and the fatigued figures of the schoolmasters, the miners form, like trees among vegetables, a solid group”.
This dynamic exhibition, made possible largely due to the generosity of the artist’s widow Nini Herman, provides us with glimpses of the daily struggle that the ordinary man and woman stoically confronted in the last century. It also acts as testament to the achievements of those people (and of the industrious Herman himself) which were possible, even when labouring against considerable odds.
‘Llafur’ will be on show at Pontardawe Arts Centre until the 12th October, before it goes on tour around Wales. This exhibition consists of works from the Josef Herman Art Foundation’s collection, curated by Dr Ceri Thomas and assisted by exhibition officer Erin Rickard.
