Spotlight: A Story in Pictures Krass Clement, Drum, 1991

“I discovered an extraordinary book many years ago by the contemporary Danish photographer #krassclement. The book was called Drum and took its name from the eponymous Irish village where all the photographs were shot in a small bar over the course of one evening in 1991.

Clement had been invited to do a project in Ireland, and arrived in Dublin by boat from Denmark, with no clear direction but a yearning to find good photographic opportunities to take his mind off the recent death of his mother. He found himself in the village of Drum, which sits near the border with Northern Ireland, and entered a bar on the edge of the town. The modest room was lit with one solitary lightbulb; it had a scrubbed wooden bar and floor; a few benches and bare walls.

As Clement settled quietly into a corner with a beer, men started to filter through the door. He had a camera and just 2 1/2 rolls of film in his pocket. He started to photograph the characters that began to populate the bar; and was drawn to the incredible face of one elderly man in particular. The images are darkly atmospheric, almost melancholic, as Clement’s assiduous eye captures the man’s pensive expressions and the deep lines of his face.

In the sparse text that accompanies the photographs in the book, the reader is informed that the bar was the meeting place for local Protestants in what is – still today – an otherwise predominantly Catholic region.

Each frame moves from one small moment to another – but always centring on this one solitary figure, lost in his own thoughts. The photographer is almost invisible as no one seems to be aware of his presence. At the end of the evening, Clement had shot 90 frames and it is these that make up this wonderful series of magnificently raw photographs.

The extraordinary group of photographs made in this pub, became a Holy Grail for me, and I eventually was able to meet with Clement to discuss representing this work for him, trying to find collectors and museums who up until now, had been unaware of his exceptional talent.

Clement always made all his own prints and each one is perfect. However, he has produced very few, and unusually, no later prints nor editions exist. We are extremely lucky to be able to represent this work at our gallery. The pictures have been beautifully printed, and the only comparison that I can find is in the spiritual, compelling work of Christopher Killip, known for the critical sharpness and exceptional print quality of his social documentary photography.

Clements’s work equals Killip’s in many ways and shows an acute humanity not often seen in photographs of this period. Each frame, and therefore each page, as one pulses through the book, cement Drum’s reputation as one of the most outstanding series I have seen. Clement’s photographs are mesmerising, and I can barely take my eyes from them every time I look at a print. This will be the first time they have ever been seen in the USA, and we are delighted and honoured to be able to bring them to a wider audience."