MAST
In the course of my work I get to meet some truly unique people. This was certainly the case on Thursday when I went to take photographs for the MAST project on Mayfield Park. Mayfield park is a mobile home park in South Dublin near Clondalkin and is the home to around 35 families. At the moment South Dublin Council are in the process of building permanent houses for the residents to move into and to commemorate the fact various groups have been documenting the lives of the residents. There is a writers group, a video documentary and my photographic record of the site as well as archives and information that the residents themselves have collected over the course of their lives.Some of the families have been there since the park opened over 35 years ago and some have always lived in a mobile home and so they are slightly anxious to be moving, so much so that three of the residents have decided to stay in mobiles but in the grounds of the new housing complex, which incidentally is just over the fence from the park they are in now. The majority of their backgrounds is from show business and the circuses that used to travel around Ireland up to the 1980's and some still hit the open road over the summer and still perform or take rides to various shows thereby maintaining the tradition. But all in all such an ecaletic mix of people you are unlikely to meet anywhere. The park has made its own little community where each has a role, each is unique and it appears that each is happy with the space that they have created for themselves. For instance you have Shay the writer, Christy the woodworker, Jim the motorbike man, Caroline the palm reader, Peggy the Picalo player and the new arrival Sister Kathleen from the Prospect Convent, new arrival as she has only been there since the late 1990's so she is still considered to be an outsider, but I gather, without her guts and determination to maintain the society in the Park the residents would not be looking forward to their new homes. Below are a small selection of some of the photographs that I took last week and I for one, wish them ever success. I really enjoyed my day, I met so many amazing people who all wanted to tell their stories, I faced no animosity what so ever and in the end, although an outsider I felt very much at home. They all wanted to ask questions about the cameras, they all wanted to talk, and they were all so friendly so these photos are for them, the residents of Mayfield Park. Thank you.
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