The UK is facing a cost of living crisis that has pushed hundreds of thousands of families into poverty. According to recent figures released by the government, in 2024, 4.3 million children live in povertywith difficulty accessing food and decent housing conditions.
Aware that the situation has deteriorated dramatically since 2022, the year of Russia’s occupation of Ukraine, Kirsty Mackay Decided to look up the title. Magic money treeCreated by a Scottish photographer in collaboration with disadvantaged communities in the Black Country, South Shields and Bristol areas between 2022 and 2023. It is funded through the Kickstarter platform By a British publisher Bluecoat PressThe material can be taken in the form of a book.
“I photographed what I saw in these areas and collaborated with the people I met”, said GuardianIn March this year, just days before an exhibition of the works opened at the New Art Gallery Walsall, which closed on 15 July. “I grew up Workshops Photography aimed at children and teenagers, I distributed small analog cameras to them.
So the project is made up of Mackay’s photographs and photographs taken by children and young people Workshops. “My photographs tell the story of the cost of living crisis [no Reino Unido] And the participants in the training add another layer, another energy”, observes the photographer. Video Published on the New Art Gallery Walsall website. “Especially the photos of the kids, doing handstands and jumps… Their photos give a different color and life to the project. My photos are more intense.”
The title of the work comes from a quote by former Prime Minister Theresa May, who said during a BBC Question Time broadcast that “there is no magic money tree that will give us all the money we want”. magazine group He wroteIn June, “poverty has worsened” in the UK as a result of decisions taken by Conservative governments over the past 14 years. like this, Magic money tree declares that it “aims to question the extent to which poverty is not a political choice”. MackayGrew up in an underprivileged neighborhood.
McKay’s project is pluralistic, involving many voices – and all of them call for awareness of poverty and the need for change in perception and, above all, for political action. “I don’t want to portray these people as victims. Poverty is a structural phenomenon, not an individual situation,” he says. “Thanks to my experiences in the past, I know that there are many people who do not know someone who depends on social support to live or who experiences homelessness; there are people who do not experience any economic difficulties in their life. For these people, it is easy to not know what is happening in the second edition of the project October 15 It will be exhibited from Bristol Photo Festival.
