New exhibition captures Galway-Clifden line history

Date Published: 13-Jun-2008

There is a widespread assumption that the landscape photograph must contain a romantic or postcard element to reflect authenticity – that it must conform to the picturesque in order to be ‘good,’ and that without these elements, the photograph is rendered useless and therefore ‘unsaleable’.

Now a new exhibition of photographs at the Galway City Museum deserves to be seen in a context removed from notions of property and ownership.

The Great Western Sleeper is a fine landscape portfolio that narrates the life of the Galway-Clifden railway line, closed in 1935 after 40 years service. The photographer is Lorraine Tuck who qualified
from Newport College, Wales, with a BA Honours in Documentary Photography in 2003.

The line was constructed in 1895, to alleviate the suffering of Connemara people who were impoverished by colonialism and political alienation.

In each of the skilfully printed and framed pieces, she exposes us to a 48 mile journey of naked countryside, stripped bare of the iron horse and rail-line, the closure of which she refers to as
“one of the major economic blunders of the West of Ireland”.

Arriving at various locations along the way, the photographer delicately weaves into each occasion, a
labyrinth of the elements, emotion, light, time and texture to document the demise of the railroad.

Oughterard, which housed one of the prominent stations along the line, is…