'89 Raving- Gavin Watson
As a party of my Uni course i was researching new photographers I had not heard of before. One of these photographers was Gavin Watson, he grew up in the 80s and captured photos of his brother and friends as skin heads in the 80s and the 1989 raving scene.
I found his photos very interesting because I have grew up hearing stories from my parents about 1989, when they used to get on a bus from Newcastle to Manchester and go to these organised raves. Gavin Watson's photos are so original because he was actually living through this time and took photos of people he was actually friends with not just a photographer taking photos of random people on the street. In an interview he said because he was from a working class family he couldn't afford to film for his camera all the time so he had to be careful of what he took. I think this is what makes the photos so good because they were thought out and not just taking photos of anything and everything he saw.
In 1989 Maggie Thatcher was prime minister so there was a strong divide between working class and upper class. However, from interviews with people who went to the raves they say that the raves brought a lot of different people together because people were just there to have a good time and be young with no worries.
In 1989 fashion had changed because people who were going to raves wanted to be comfortable so the bigger and baggier the better. In the 80s you were a skin head or punk ect. This meant you were put into a box and people got an impression of you by what you dressed like. In 1989 when people would wear bright colours and bucket hats people felt a lot more freedom and it was less about sticking to a certain trend or style all the time and more just wear what you feel most comfortable in.
