In She Sells Shellfish, the Welsh director Lily Tiger crafts a poetic tribute to the generations of women who’ve harvested the waters off South Wales. The film introduces viewers to Megan Haines, the daughter of a shellfish farmer with a passion for regenerative ocean farming and seaweed harvesting, and Carol Watts, a cheery fishmonger at Swansea Market whose great-grandmother was a cockle gatherer.
By shooting on black-and-white Super 8 film, Tiger cultivates a nostalgic look that allows her to seamlessly weave between new footage and archival imagery of female cockle pickers working on local sand flats generations ago. These evocative visuals, combined with the sounds of crashing waves, crying gulls and low-humming boat motors lend the work a sense of place – one that only deepens upon learning that some of the still images were themselves developed using seaweed rather than darkroom chemicals. Through her delicately constructed collage, Tiger explores a little-known feminist history while detailing how the work of Haines and Watts is inspired by their connection to the past and hopes for the future.
Via Girls in Film
