Dark Tales: British Documentary Photography and the Gothic
From 17 September to 20 December 2026, the Martin Parr Foundation in Bristol presents Dark Tales: British Documentary Photography and the Gothic, an exhibition exploring the complex relationship between British documentary photography and the Gothic imagination.
Spanning more than eighty years, the exhibition traces a portrait of Britain from the postwar period to the present day. Its images move through declining industrial landscapes, claustrophobic domestic interiors, isolated communities and unsettling nocturnal scenes. Together, they reveal a country that appears resilient but also haunted by social change, uncertainty and unease.
Curated by Isaac Blease, Dark Tales brings together celebrated photographs and lesser known works, many selected from more than 5,000 prints held in the Martin Parr Foundation collection. Rather than following a strictly historical approach, the exhibition creates a visual narrative based on mood, association and atmosphere.
The Gothic becomes a way of looking at documentary photography itself. Familiar places and ordinary situations can suddenly feel strange or threatening. Fear and fascination coexist, suggesting that darkness is often most powerful when it emerges from everyday life.
The exhibition also considers why Gothic imagery tends to return during periods of uncertainty. Photography has long been used to document political, social and moral tensions, reflecting the anxieties of its time through images of the real world. Today, documentary photography is facing another moment of transformation. Questions around trust, the role of the photographer and the growing presence of Artificial Intelligence have created new uncertainty around the meaning and authority of photographic images.
For Blease, this makes the Gothic a particularly relevant lens through which to reconsider documentary photography. The exhibition embraces ambiguity and the possibility that a photograph can generate different interpretations, emotions and meanings.
The term documentary is also treated with some flexibility. While several photographers in the exhibition work firmly within the documentary tradition, others question or deliberately disrupt its conventions. The selection is therefore guided less by rigid definitions than by the desire to create a shared visual atmosphere.
Dark Tales features work by Kjell Åke Andersson, Keith Arnatt, Bill Brandt, John Bulmer, Jim Dow, Anna Fox, Robert Frank, Colin Jones, Clive Landen, Don McCullin, Lee Miller, Peter Mitchell, John Myers, Akihiko Okamura, Sue Packer, Martin Parr, Gilles Peress, Vinca Petersen, Charlie Phillips, Sarah Pickering, Alice Poyzer, Derek Ridgers, Chris Shaw, Graham Smith, Jem Southam, Jo Spence, Janine Wiedel and Donovan Wylie.
Dark Tales: British Documentary Photography and the Gothic
from 17 September to 20 December 2026
Martin Parr Foundation -Bristol – UK
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