Outside the tall metal gates of Greenham Common airbase, a protestor stands with her arms crossed. Behind her is the debris of camp life: a mattress, plastic bin bags, a set of drawers containing books, papers and cat food, and a Christmas tree. Her tousled black hair and steely expression evoke the challenges of her environment.
This photograph of Hiroko Sumpter was taken in December 1982 at the Greenham Common women’s peace camp. Sumpter was one of thousands of women who took part in a protest and blockade against the housing of nuclear weapons at the base. The photographer was called Joan Wakelin.
Between October 2023 and February 2024, as part of my doctoral placement in the Royal Photographic Society Archive at the V&A, I catalogued Joan Wakelin’s archive. Despite being inclusive of women members since its inception, the Royal Photographic Society collection is dominated by work by men photographers. Wakelin’s sizeable archive – 43 boxes of photographic prints and 24 boxes of archival material – is one of the exceptions.
Whilst Wakelin began her career in the 1960s influenced by Pictorialism – treating photography as a fine art – her most famous work is in more of a documentary or photojournalistic style. Her archive includes photographs of labourers in Sri Lanka in 1976, Cambodian and Laotian refugees in Thailand in 1980, and Vietnamese refugees in Hong Kong in 1989. Considering Wakelin’s positionality as a white British woman photographer, her photos provide an interesting starting point for conversations about race, gender and representation in photography.
In an unpublished manuscript titled ‘a personal guide to journalism’, now in the V&A Archive, Wakelin wrote ‘I am often asked if I get away with it because I am a woman.’ Her career was undoubtedly shaped by her gender, working in an overwhelmingly male-dominated field. She was refused a place on a photography course in 1964 because ‘the organiser did not think a married mother of two should take one of the limited places.’ In her manuscript, she described experiencing sexual harassment whilst on assignment.
In 1980, Wakelin participated in a landmark exhibition titled ‘Women’s Images of Men’ at the ICA, organised by the Women’s Arts Alliance and curator Sandy Lairne. Other exhibiting artists included Anya Teixeira, Sally Greenhill and Ana Maria Pacheco. Wakelin ‘found meeting other women artists a stimulating experience, as was the inter-play of ideas and feelings’. Her photograph ‘Man and Girl’ was singled out by the Arnolfini Review as a ‘remarkable image which forces stark recognition of an instance of absolute male dominance. Wakelin has confronted this male ego in her role as artist (read, male); the gaze back is equal to equal’.
Another exhibited photograph, titled alternately ‘Phil the Flash’ and ‘Footballer of the Year’, caused a stir for its glimpse of male genitalia. In a series of events which crystallised the gendered double standards around nudity, Wakelin was banned from Edinburgh Camera Club for twenty years and, in her words, deemed ‘unsuitable to be a member of the London Salon’. The Wakelin archive has an envelope which previously contained a copy of the offending print – complete with annotations that convey her frustration.
On the other hand, being a woman sometimes helped her slip under the radar – often she was assumed not to be a photographer. In the case of Greenham Common, she wrote that ‘being a female helped enormously on this assignment… These warriors had an in-built hatred of the male species, and woe betide any man who strayed into their camp.’ Yet it was a complex position: ‘I was accepted (up to a point), but was never completely integrated’.
Wakelin oscillated between observer and participant. In order ‘to get my pictures’, she wrote, ‘I had my face painted, and sat on the break-in ladders’, but eventually ‘the women turned against me’. Her attitude to the women protestors was complicated: ‘although I was not ‘one of them’, and found their way of life unacceptable, I had formed a genuine affection and somehow an admiration for their courage and for their determination.’
This ambiguity distinguishes Wakelin’s photographs from other notable images of Greenham Common by members of Format Photographic Agency, who were both activists and photographers. Wakelin photographed the peace camp over a relatively long period because she lived nearby, not because she was a protestor. Her political opinions are unclear, at least from the archival material that we have. In an interview for a New Zealand newspaper, she remarked ‘I hope my pictures don’t have political impact because I’m not political’. But in another interview, her position on feminism is more ambivalent: ‘Am I a ‘feminist’? – perhaps of a kind, but to be contained in a single category is not the answer’.
Another aspect that stands out is Wakelin’s focus on an individual protestor. On her first day at Greenham Common, Wakelin befriended Hiroko (also known as ‘Hiro’) Sumpter, a feminist and anti-nuclear protestor born in Japan. Sumpter is a constant presence in Wakelin’s photographs. Over a six month period between December 1982 and May 1983, we see her hair change from long and black to short, spiky and grey.
Very few images of Greenham Common foreground women of colour, so Wakelin’s photographs are particularly unique. I have found little information about Sumpter, apart from a fascinating article by scholar Ulrike Wöhr. She appears to have played a key role in connecting the Greenham Common protestors with Japanese grassroots women’s groups and anti-nuclear activists. One Japanese protestor at Greenham Common perceived that Sumpter was racially discriminated against by other women, and ‘taken advantage of… as a cook and a caretaker’.
Perhaps Wakelin and Sumpter formed a particular bond because they both felt, in some way, like an outsider? As Wakelin wrote in her manuscript, ‘one cannot be a ‘lady’ and a phototojournalist – wild women are more likely to succeed’.
This article was written by photography historian, Emily Beswick. Join Emily for a workshop exploring Joan Wakelin’s photographs and archive on Friday, 9 August 2024.
Wild women: Joan Wakelin and Greenham Common – Workshop at V&A South Kensington
