Saturday Town
Saturday Town is an award winning photographic portrait project. Since 2013 Casey Orr has travelled the UK with her pop up portrait studio, photographing young women and all fashionable folks in towns and cities on Saturday afternoons; exploring identity and self expression through fashion and portraiture.
see ya saturday
The project started in Leeds in 2013 as Saturday Girl. This was the beginning of a nationwide survey of fashion and youth culture that has spanned 20 cities and towns, photographing over 800 people, with numerous exhibitions and publications. The project won the prestigious Format Festival Award in 2019 and was published by Bluecoat Press in 2021. It has been featured in numerous publications including The Observer Magazine, Aesthetica, The British Journal of Photography and AP Magazine.
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back on the streets
Saturday Girl About Town, the 2021/22 iteration of the project, uses portraiture to explore the ways in which young folks navigated a re-emergence onto the streets after the upheaval of the pandemic. This work was directly situated in high street spaces and explores youth identity in relation to the changes happening in public spaces as retail units and markets stand empty and flagship stores and household brands disappear from town centres. The locations were Burnley, Blackpool, Redcar, Wigan and Chester.
hit the north
The project expanded in this time to include opportunities for young creatives who can explore the themes of the work beyond being photographed; through thinking and making in response to their changing city, their experiences, their futures. The creative programme also embeds opportunities for professional practice experiences in the studio for youth interns.
it never ends!
In 2023/24 the project continues as Saturday Town in Leeds, Kirklees, Burnley, Redcar and Barrow in Furness, building on making visible the identities for UK youth today. Identity itself, dynamically changeable and complex, is being reevaluated; from class and culture via era defining experiences of pandemic and social upheaval. The project continues to explore the multiplicities of experience, moving away from gender terms (girl) in reflection of fluid identities. As Saturday Town, the promise of freedom, of exploration and the potential that is Saturday is still central.
The portraits will be part of an important national body of work developed across England between 2013 and 2024 with Open Eye Gallery, Liverpool.
