Pop Star Reflects on Valleys Heritage at Art Exhibition

“My friends are still in the valleys, my family are still in the valleys, my heart is in the valleys.” Ian Watkins, widely known as H from Steps, has maintained an almost three-decade-long pop music career and recently found success as a painter, yet he has consistently remembered his origins. The celebrity grew up in Cwmparc in Rhondda, south Wales, and cherishes memories of visiting his paternal grandmother in nearby Ton Pentre and maternal grandfather in Treherbert. He stated that the artworks displayed at a special exhibition portraying the south Wales valleys evoked a feeling of “my life flashing before me.” Watkins remarked, “All the stories I’ve had from my grandparents and my parents and also the life I’ve lived – it is kind of incredible to see it all in one place.” The Valleys exhibition, hosted at National Museum Cardiff, showcases a collection of over 200 art pieces, including paintings, photography, film, and applied art, all depicting life in the valleys. The exhibition delves into how the area was transformed by the rise of industry and its subsequent decline. The singer noted that he recognized many of the landscapes in the photographs or paintings, having painted similar scenes himself. The portrayals of men, engaged in both work and leisure, brought his grandfather to mind. He shared, “He was a miner – I’ve actually got his miner’s lamp in my house.” Watkins recounted, “He used to tell me amazing stories: he was one of 13 children and they used to top and tail in beds, their mother would make all of their sandwiches in tin boxes to go down the mines, they’d give her part of their pay packet, they’d all get scrubbed in a tin bath in the front room and they had constant ‘eyeliner’ on because of the coal dust. “People made do with what they had and made the best of it.” From the striking green landscapes to the industrial black soot, Watkins expressed his satisfaction at seeing the valleys represented in their full scope. He commented, “I think people have a perception of the valleys being quite grey and dark and insular – and there is a lot of that depicted in these paintings but there’s also joy, happiness and vibrancy too.” He added, “There’s so much heart and warmth. As the song says – ‘we’ll keep a welcome in the hillside’, and it’s so true.” The valleys, which span from Carmarthenshire to Monmouthshire, are renowned for their coal mining heritage and rows of terraced houses. This region has served as an an inspiration for artists globally since the 18th Century. The industrial revolution permanently altered the landscape and its communities. By the early 19th Century, south Wales was the world’s leading producer of iron; a century later, one-third of the world’s coal was extracted from the area, and a significant portion of the local population was employed in these industries. This history has fostered a distinctive heritage and culture. Bronwen Colquhoun, senior curator of photography at Museum Wales, based at National Museum Cardiff, observed that many valleys residents, like Watkins, were deeply affected by the exhibition. She stated, “A few people who have seen the exhibition told me that they feel ‘seen’, which is really moving.” Colquhoun described it as “a really layered exhibition and there hasn’t really been a show before on this scale that explores working-class art history in such depth.” Among the photographic collections on display is Coalfaces: Life After Coal in the Afan Valley by Tina Carr and Annemarie Schöne, which illustrates life in the area. Ms Colquhoun remarked, “This is a really important body of work.” She elaborated, “They were working with a number of different communities across the Afan Valley and it was in 1991 so it was after deindustrialisation, when many of these communities had been completely neglected and marginalised and it was a way of kind of empowering those communities through photography.” She noted that as part of the initiative, the photographers conducted workshops and distributed disposable cameras to community members, enabling them to create their own images. She characterized it as “a very kind of beautiful, kind of an intimate project that tells a story of a community at a particular moment in time and against quite a political backdrop but they’re very beautiful, joyful pictures.” Another photograph featured in the exhibition was captured by Swedish photographer Kjell-Åke Andersson, who visited Bargoed in the 1970s. It portrays a mother and her young son at home in 1973 on the day of Princess Anne’s (now the Princess Royal) wedding, with the event visible on a television behind them. Ms Colquhoun explained that the photographer had resided with the family in the picture and aimed to document domestic life and leisure activities within valleys communities. She expressed, “I just think it’s a beautiful picture because it shows the kind of innocence of childhood, it’s just really joyful, I love it, so beautifully captured.” A notably different photograph also in the exhibition is It’s Called Ffasiwn (Look It Up), taken in Merthyr in 2016 by Clémentine Schneidermann and Charlotte James. Ms Colquhoun clarified, “They programmed workshops for children around photography, fashion design and styling.” She added, “The real intention behind the work is to challenge the stereotypes of these communities and to give voice to the children specifically and the young people, and to really show how ambitious they are and how inspiring they are and how creative they are and how colourful they are.” Photographer Paul Cabuts, a native of the valleys, has created a series of photographs titled End of the Row, also exhibited. She explained, “He’s really interested in the architecture of the terrace house but from a slightly different perspective from what one normally views them, so he he went and photographed the ends of terraces.” She continued, “They’re just a really interesting way of highlighting that kind of vernacular architecture that came through the coal mining industry, so things like the terraced house and the chapel.” She shared that she had been moved to tears by some of the exhibition responses. A comment left in the visitors’ book by a bus driver particularly stood out. The bus driver wrote, “I drive up and down the this valley every single day” and added something akin to “the faces I see on a daily basis are the faces that I see in that gallery at the minute’.” She found it “just so moving.” Colquhoun expressed, “We’re hoping that it really resonates with people and is a really positive representation of the region and its people and its history.” The Valleys exhibition offers free admission and will be on display at the National Museum Cardiff until 5 January. Copyright 2024 BBC. All rights reserved. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. Read about our approach to external linking.