Wayne Walton talks to Maxine Beuret and milkman Steve Heyden about door-step milk delivery in Waltham Forest
“I want to prove that the milkman and milk floats are part of the cultural heritage, and a big part is the customers, the local residents and their relationship with milkmen in the past, and in fact currently, now!”
Surely you remember the good old days when the masses across Waltham Forest, indeed the UK, collected their milk on their door-step, awoken in the very early hours to the gentle clashes of milk bottles, the hum and whizzing of the electric milk floats intermittently stopping and starting along the street, and the ever so quick-paced thunder of running feet of the milkman, at least on my street, going from door-to-door, reminding us that yet another day has dawned…the milkman is here…it’s time to start a new day!
Maxine Beuret in her exhibition ‘Door-step Delivery’ takes us back in time, through the years, on a journey she believes will evoke lasting memories some people may have taken for granted, as we see the times changing, but enough to persuade people to look back and share those memories or stories with her, which she hopes to include in her forthcoming book.
Maxine’s exhibition at One Hoe Street is four years of research and just one place where the people of Waltham Forest could meet and talk with her, view the exhibition so far, otherwise she invites you to message her on Twitter @twopintsplease1 or visit her Facebook page mentioned below.
To further help jog our memories, Maxine has created a series of videos capturing views only the milkman would see behind the scene, and these together with photographs from the exhibition Maxine is currently curating at the One Hoe Street Hub can be viewed on the special MULTIMEDIA PAGE we have set up to accompany this report.
Maxine Beuret writes:
Maxine Beuret’s photography straddles a boundary between documentary and art. The images are constructed with a careful choice of content, framing and lighting to create an evocative image that captures a sense of place.
The photography is married with environment sound and oral history to build short videos. Much of the work is made in collaboration with milkmen, managers and mechanics working in the industry. She has been working with Parker Diaries for 4 years.
She is currently studying a practice-based PhD at Kingston University School of Film and Photography, researching electric milk floats.
Her work can be seen and she can be contacted at the following links:
maxinebeuret.com
Twitter
Facebook
London Doctoral Design Centre
Memories
Maxine requests that if you have any memories or thoughts about door-step milk delivery locally you share them using the one page questionnaire which she will be happy to provide.
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