Interview with Rod McLoughlin in the Jersey Evening Post today /  by Martin Toft

Last Friday I did a comprehensive interview with Rod McLoughlin, Jersey finest journalist on arts and culture about my new film, The Seaflower Venture, currently on show at The Channel Islands Contemporary Art Show at Capital House in St Helier, curated and produced by ArtHouse Jersey and Art for Guernsey in association with Les Champs Libres. It's published today in the Jersey Evening Post and you can read it online here too.

Images: Archive objects loaned from the Société Jersiaise
Remarks by Charles Robin, agent (Diary of Charles Robin) 1767-1787. Lord Coutanche Library (PEO/I/D/ROB).
Jean-Frederick Gibaut, with the inscription: ‘John Frederick Gibaut, born in Bahia 22nd May 1823, daguerreotyped in Muritiba,November 1843.’

Opening of The Channels Islands Contemporary Art Show /  by Martin Toft

Fantastic crowds last night at the opening of The Channel Islands Contemporary Art Show curated and produced by ArtHouse Jersey and Art for Guernsey in association with Les Champs Libres in Rennes. Thanks to all friends and supporters who turned up on a cold night in Jersey. Tonight I'm taking part in a walk through the gallery with talks by some of the artists involved from 18:00 onwards - come along if you're in town!

#seaflowerventure #entrepot

Premiére of my new film: The Seaflower Venture /  by Martin Toft

My new film The Seaflower Venture is based on the life of Charles Robin, Jersey’s premier cod-merchant who founded the most successful firm on the Gaspé Coast in 1766. Using extracts from his own diaries and a fictional biographical narrative of Robin’s life the film re-imagines a merchant triangle – a three-pointed trading system with production in Canada, management in Jersey and markets in Brazil, Italy, Spain, Portugal and England.

It will premiére at The Channel Islands Contemporary Art Show alongside a selection of images from Brazil and some archive objects loaned from the Société Jersiaise. The launch of the exhibition takes place on Thursday 18 January 17:30-19:00 at ArtHouse Jersey at Capital House, St Helier, Jersey.

The film is the first in a series of outcomes, such as a set of publications and exhibitions planned for production in the next couple of years from Entrepôt - my maritime photographic research project exploring the history of Jersey’s cod-fishing trade in Canada and its merchant networks in the West Indies, South America, Mediterranean and Baltic in the 18th and 19th centuries.

I hope you will be able to make it next Thursday for the opening - if not, I'll share a sneak preview of The Seaflower Venture afterwards.

The film was produced with funding from ArtHouse Jersey.

#seaflowerventure #entrepot

In Production of my new film: The Seaflower Venture /  by Martin Toft

Since 2017 I have been working on Entrepôt - a maritime photographic research project exploring the history of Jersey’s cod-fishing trade in Canada and its merchant networks in the West Indies, South America and Mediterranean in the 18th and 19th centuries. The project is centred around cod-merchant Charles Robin who founded the most successful Jersey firm on the Gaspé coast in 1766 and explore how, through the prism of colonial and family history, Jersey’s original wealth generated by the proceeds from the North Atlantic fisheries and maritime trade lay the foundation for the island’s future prosperity.

Several trips to colonial outposts in the maritime network has been completed, travelling over 60,000 kms across land, sea and air, researching multiple archives, collaborating with many experts (both locally and internationally) and developing a large repository of new visual and textual material. A number of outcomes, such as publications, exhibitions and a film are planned for completion in the next 3 years. Recently, I received a development grant from ArtHouse Jersey to produce a 5 minute trailer of the film, The Seaflower Venture and is currently in production collaborating with a sound designer, script editor and film editor. The film will feature footage shot in historical locations in Jersey, Canada, Brazil, Italy, Spain, Portugal and England between 2017-2023.

The narrative of the film will be created around a sea journey of a Robin ship loosely based on an actual abstract journal of a voyage recorded in a Deck Log written by sea captain Peter Briard (senior) who was employed by the Charles Robin Company and successfully mastered the Robin ships ‘Day’, ‘Oliver Blanchard’, ‘Christopher Columbus’ and ‘C.R.C.’ from Gaspé to Naples and Palermo every year for nearly twenty years between 1818 to the late 1830s. It will include a two-hander poetic dialogue between a young and old Charles Robin based on extracts from two archival documents, such as his own 18th century diary (The Early Journals of Charles Robin 1767-73 & 1787) and an unpublished biographical narrative (The Seaflower Venture) written by Phyllis Gertrude Ross aka Lady McKie held in the library at Société Jersiaise. The narration will be voiced by John Henry Falle aka The Story Beast.

Here a few film stills…

#entrepot #seaflowerventure

Entrepôt in the Bay of Biscay /  by Martin Toft

When Charles Robin first sailed across the Atlantic in 1763 to seek new business opportunities in BNA (British North America) he observed Basque fishermen and women dry curing cod-fish on the shores in Newfoundland. These observations was valuable when he established his company with his brother John, first in Cape Breton and later in the Gaspé peninsula. Recent digitisation of some 230,000 documents from Charles Robin Company at Musée de la Gaspésie reveal frequent cod-trade with markets in the Bay of Biscay with Robin ships sailing annually from 1767 to 1804 and again 1814-1842 to seaports of mainly Bilbao, San Sebastian, Santander, Coruna and Vigo (occassionally also smaller ports of Santona and Ribadeo - depending on market conditions.) In the archives in Bilbao several judicial documents exists of Jersey ships with damaged cargo of cod-fish being shipwrecked on the precarious sandbank at Portugeleta before entering the estuary of Nervíon River leading into Bilbao. Iron ore was a commodity that Britain needed in large quantities to fuel the industrial revolution and in Bilbao over 200 iron mines was extracting the precious metal bringing it from open and underground pits directly via cable towers system to ships on the Nervíon River. In the last 16 days I've visited each trading post as part of my maritime project, Entrepôt and experienced the unique culture and people of North West Spain that Robin diligently learned a trade from that he was to perfect and commercialise into a prosperous business establishing merchant networks in Caribbean, South America and Mediterranean. #entrepot

Exploding Cinema at ArtHouse Jersey Capital House /  by Martin Toft

Join me this weekend where I will be screening a couple of short films, Untitled and Plein-Air I-V as part of Exploding Cinema at ArtHouse Jersey Capital House. Both films were made in 1999 when I decided to walk to war in Kosovo from my studio in South England as a form of protest. During the 78 days it took to walk across Europe I made a number of spontaneous performances in the landscape in the guise of a plein-air painter. Some of these parodies were recorded and form part of INTERVENTIONS a much broader installation of video, photography and found material, first exhibited at the Danish Museum of Photographic Art in 2000.

Both films alludes to the absurdity of making art and futility of war, which in our current climate may resonate with those affected by the war in Ukraine. As Russian missiles are destroying homes and lives of innocent civilians, the irony of an Exploding Cinema is not lost on me. It starts at 6:30-9:30pm with different programmes on Saturday 3 and Sunday 4 December and promises to be a packed programme of underground short films, live music and mind-bending visuals! Featuring work from Rachel Ara, Martin Toft, Mike Davies, Lee White, Toby Norman, Dean Porter, Rebecca Coley and London upstarts and filmmakers. Book your ticket here!

Talk about Jersey's links with Transatlantic Slave Trade at Jersey Museum /  by Martin Toft

If you are in town, please join me tomorrow for a talk, The Legacy of Islanders Involved in Transatlantic Slave Trade about my research and photographic work in Canada, Brazil and Belize as part of Black History Month at Jersey Museum. I will be discussing how discoveries of images and documents in various archives became starting points for Entrepôt - a maritime photographic research project exploring the history of Jersey’s cod-fishing trade in Canada and its merchant networks in the West Indies, South America, Mediterranean and Baltic in the 18th and 19th centuries. A selection of some of these archival records and photographs I made in response form part of Jersey Heritage’s Trade Roots - Jersey’s Links to Transatlantic Slavery exhibition at the Victorian House at Jersey Museum. #entrepot