Homer Sykes

Sykes's father, also named Homer Warwick Sykes, was a Canadian-born American of English extraction who worked for the China National Aviation Corporation in Shanghai; his mother, Helen Grimmitt, was born in Hong Kong but her family emigrated to Canada in the early 1930s. The couple were married in Shanghai in August 1947; but in June 1948, at an early stage of his wife's pregnancy, Homer was killed in an accident at Lunghua airfield. In September 1948, Helen returned from Shanghai to her family home in Vancouver, where her son was born in January 1949.[1][2]

Helen and her infant son Homer travelled to Liverpool on the SS Empress of Canada, arriving in September 1950. She remarried shortly thereafter. The family settled in Birmingham; like his father, Homer's step-father was a keen photographer. Homer too was a keen photographer as a teenager, creating a darkroom at Sidcot, his boarding school, that he would take home during vacations.[2]

In 1968 Sykes started a three-year course at the London College of Printing (LCP),[1][2] while sharing a house in St John's Wood.[3] In the summer vacation during his first year, he went to New York, and was impressed by the work of current photographers – Cartier-Bresson, Davidson, Friedlander, Frank, Uzzle and Winogrand – that he saw at the Museum of Modern Art.[2]

While wondering about a new photographic project, Sykes serendipitously came across a story on the Britannia Coconut Dancers in an issue of In Britain magazine.[2] This led him to research other local festivals in Britain at the archives of Cecil Sharp House.[4] Sykes' photography of these festivals was inspired by that of Benjamin Stone, but he approached them with a modern sensibility and a small-format camera, "[trying] to include the unintended participants and to document the unfolding drama in a contemporary urban environment".[5] After viewing a touring exhibition of Stone and Sykes' photography of "festivals, customs and pageants", Colin MacInnes wrote that:

Although these photographs do great credit to Sykes both as a photographer and as a social investigator, it should not be thought that his interests lie exclusively in the direction of barrel parades, beating the bounds, or the Queensferry burryman (who saunters around the boozers looking like a floral dalek on appropriate occasions). For . . . [Sykes'] chief interest is in a more varied photography. . . . At [giving us a heightened image of reality], Homer Sykes is very good indeed. . . . [When photographing a pageant], he seems to have caught the performers rather off their guard – not so much when doing this traditional thing, as having done it, or being about to do it.[6]

The photographs also appeared in Once a Year: Some Traditional British Customs, a book (published by Gordon Fraser, uniform with Patrick Ward's Wish You Were Here) in which Sykes presents one or more photographs of and a detailed explanatory text for each of 81 customs—for example, three photographs (on pp. 105–108) of the annual auction on the first Monday following St Peter's Day (29 June) at the Grapes Inn of the mowing and grazing rights to Yarnton Meadow (or Yarnton West Mead), Yarnton (Oxfordshire). Once a Year has been described as "a beautifully photographed, tender and often humorous document";[7] and, 32 years after its publication, as remaining "[p]robably the best study of English folklore and ritual".[8]

But Sykes's interests went far beyond annual customs. Annie-Laure Wanaverbecq of Maison de la photographie Robert Doisneau writes that "Observing his countrymen with humour and curiosity, over several years [Sykes] produced a fabulous visual archive of a nation in crisis and beset by doubt."[9] This included the glam rock, punk, new wave and other music/fashion scenes of Britain.[1][10]

Michaël Houlette of Maison de la photographie Robert Doisneau writes:

The combination of several people in the same frame characterizes most of the photographs by Homer Sykes selected for [an exhibition of his work of the 1970s]. Often the structure of his images rests on two or three main figures who stand out and reveal themselves by an expression or attitude. There is no overly obvious direction or composition, just a keen observation and a systematic method of shooting: a short focal length, some preliminary observation and a certain English manner, frank and courteous, to come in contact with people that he sometimes photographs at very close range (surprisingly, they also seem to ignore the photographer who is at work). Present at the event, invisible in the image, Homer Sykes made discretion a real trademark. And if it's evidence of knowing how to see, it's the relinquishment of the frame to those he photographs: "My pictures are about people, what they wear, how they look, how they interact with each other, against a background that sets the scene. They are not about me".[11]

After absorbing advice from David Hurn, then a part-time lecturer at LCP who was living nearby, as well as other photographers that he met through Hurn,[2] Sykes moved on to photographing news stories for the Weekend Telegraph, Observer, Sunday Times, Newsweek, Now, Time,[2] and New Society.[4] He worked with various agencies including Viva,[12] and from 1989 to 2005 was with Network Photographers.

Sykes photographed the British landscape, as well as pubs, prehistoric remains and other scenes in Britain, for various books published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson. He also found time for his own projects: Hunting with Hounds, "a closely observed documentation of another set of rituals that define a dimension of the English way of life",[8] and On the Road Again, photographs of four North American road trips taken over three decades.[13]

When the Grimstone Foundation invited Sykes to photograph Shanghai, the city of his conception, he jumped at the opportunity. A high point for him was his discovery that the building on Jiang Xi Lu where his parents lived still existed, as the Fu Zhou building.[14] Sykes's collection was exhibited and published as Shanghai Odyssey.

Sykes has taught in the master's course in Photojournalism and Documentary Photography at the London College of Communication.

In 2014, Maison de la photographie Robert Doisneau (Gentilly, Paris) held a major exhibition of Sykes' work from the 1970s.[9][10]

• Birmingham Central Library[45]
• British Council[46]
• British Government Art Collection[13]
• Victoria and Albert Museum (London)[47]
• Museum Folkwang (Essen)[48]

• British Image 1: Photographs by Homer Sykes, Claire Schwob, John Myers, Daniel Meadows, Bryn Campbell, Roslyn Banish, Ian Dobbie, and Paul Carter. London: Arts Council of Great Britain, 1975. ISBN 978-0728700352. Sykes' "Calendar Customs" appears on pp. 4–15.
• The Facts about a Pop Group: Featuring Wings. London: Whizzard, Deutsch, 1976. ISBN 0-233-96771-0. Sydney: Angus & Robertson, 1976. ISBN 0-207-13410-3. New York: Harmony, 1977. ISBN 0-517-52983-1. Text by Dave Gelly. About the group Wings.
  • Wie eine Pop-Gruppe arbeitet. Musik erklärt für junge Leser. Hamburg: Tessloff, 1978. ISBN 3-7886-0801-3.
• Once a Year: Some Traditional British Customs. London: Gordon Fraser, 1977. ISBN 0-900406-68-2.
• The English Season. London: Pavilion, 1986. ISBN 1-85145-035-1. Topsfield, Mass.: Salem House, 1987. ISBN 0-88162-236-2. Text by Godfrey Smith. On the social "season".
• The Village Pub. Country Series 26. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1992. ISBN 0-297-83125-9. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1996. ISBN 0-297-83561-0. London: Phoenix Illustrated, 1998. ISBN 0-7538-0434-4. Text by Roger Protz.
  • English Village Pubs. New York: Abbeville, 1992. ISBN 1-55859-409-4.
• Mysterious Britain: Fact and Folklore. Country Series 30. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1993. ISBN 0-297-83196-8. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1995. ISBN 0-297-83453-3. London: Phoenix Illustrated, 1998. ISBN 0-7538-0432-8. London: Cassell, 2001. ISBN 1-84188-149-X.
• The Great Stones of England. Weidenfeld Country Miniatures. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1994. ISBN 0-297-83323-5. On megaliths.
• The Storm Is Passing Over: A Look at Black Churches in Britain. London: Thames & Hudson, 1995. ISBN 0-500-27826-1. Text by Roy Kerridge.
• Celtic Britain. Country Series 40. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1997. ISBN 0-297-82210-1. London: Phoenix Illustrated, 1998. ISBN 0-7538-0128-0. London: Cassell, 2001. ISBN 1-84188-150-3.
• On the Road Again. London: Mansion Editions, 2002. ISBN 0-9542233-0-6.[49][50]
• Shanghai Odyssey. Stockport: Dewi Lewis, 2002. ISBN 1-899235-14-0.[n 1]
• Hunting with Hounds. London: Mansion Editions, 2004. ISBN 0-9542233-1-4 (hardback). London: Mansion Editions, 2005. ISBN 0-9542233-2-2 (paperback).
• Goodbye to London: Radical Art and Politics in the Seventies, ed. Astrid Proll. Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz, 2010. ISBN 978-3-7757-2739-6. Contains a chapter by Sykes, "Grunwick was different", about the Grunwick dispute.
• This is England. Paris: Poursuite, 2014. ISBN 978-2-918960-77-5. Published to accompany "England 1970–1980" at Maison de la photographie Robert Doisneau.[n 2]
• Once a Year: Some Traditional British Customs. Stockport: Dewi Lewis, 2016. ISBN 978-1-911306-03-0. An augmented edition of the 1977 book.[n 3]
• Blitz Club Blitz Kids. Paris: Poursuite, 2017. ISBN 978-2-918960-95-9. Photographs of the Blitz kids.[n 4]
• My British Archive: The Way We Were 1968–1983. Stockport: Dewi Lewis, 2018. ISBN 978-1-911306-40-5.[n 5]
• Colour Works: The 1980s and 1990s. Stockport: Dewi Lewis, 2021. ISBN 978-1-911306-73-3[n 6]
• Before the Blue Wall. [Little Neston, Ches.]: Fistful of Books, 2022. Photographs of the area demolished in order to create the London Olympic Park.[n 7]

• Stonehenge: 1970s Counterculture. Southport: Café Royal, 2013.[n 8]
• Working Men: Club and Coal. Southport: Café Royal, 2013.[n 9]
• Blitz Kids: Skins and Silver Spoons. Southport: Café Royal, 2013.[n 10]
• Once a Year: 1970s Folklore in Britain. Southport: Café Royal, 2013.[n 11]
• Toff's Hat Flat Cap. Southport: Café Royal, 2013.[n 12]
• Brick Lane and Co: Whitechapel in the 1970s. Southport: Café Royal, 2013.[n 13]
• A Tinker's Tale. Southport: Café Royal, 2013.[n 14]
• Once a Year: Folklore in Britain Now. Southport: Café Royal, 2013.[n 15]
• Saltaire 1981: Still a Model Mill Village. Southport: Café Royal, 2014. On Saltaire, a model village in Bradford.[n 16]
• Mexico 1973: Mazatlan and Heading South. Southport: Café Royal, 2014.[n 17]
• Biddy Boys Ireland 1972. Southport: Café Royal, 2015.[n 18]
• Made in Roath. Southport: Café Royal, 2015. Photographs of Made in Roath.[n 19]
• Running Riots and the Days After. Southport: Café Royal, 2015.[n 20]
• My Britain 1970–1980s. Southport: Café Royal, 2015. To accompany the exhibition "My Britain 1970–1980" at Les Douches la Galerie, Paris.[n 21]
• Sloanes & Rahs. Southport: Café Royal, 2015. Edition of 150 copies.[n 22]
• Sir Freddie Laker Inaugural Skytrain Flight 1977. Southport: Café Royal, 2021. Edited by Craig Atkinson.[n 23]

• Official website
• "Homer Sykes: Once a Year: Some Traditional British Customs", Luminous Lint, September 2007. Forty of Sykes' images from the book Once a Year, with shortened versions of the texts.