Exhibition Notes

Cardiff Docks History

Cardiff long had a small quay on the river Taff. From 1794, the Glamorganshire Canal brought iron from Merthyr Tydfil. Bute West Dock opened in 1839. Three more followed. Cardiff became one of the world’s largest ports with seven miles of quays.

Railways brought coal to Cardiff’s docks from south Wales mines. They took back pit props, food and goods. In 1913, Cardiff, Penarth and Barry together exported 30 million tons of coal.

The growing port drew people to Cardiff from across the British Isles, the British Empire, and beyond. From Ireland, Somaliland, Yemen, the Caribbean, Norway and many other countries. These migrants built docks and railways, sailed ships, and serviced the port. They made Cardiff into the city it is today.

Work on the ships and docks was hard, poorly paid and insecure. It was sometimes dangerous. In wartime, sailors from Britain’s colonies helped carry vital products. Many Cardiff sailors drowned when their ships were sunk.

People from around the world settled near the docks and formed families. They created the diverse Tiger Bay community painted by Jack Sullivan. Coal exports ended 60 years ago and the docks have shrunk. Their legacy and the people of Tiger Bay remain.

Lyn Eynon

Community and Education

I feel that Sullivan was born into a sense of community. The day he was born, his father received two telegrams –– one saying that his son was born and the other that his brother had died, washed overboard at sea. In this way, Sullivan was born tied to the seafaring life, a bond that would give him his “greatest joy” as a youth –– going down to the docks.

With this upbringing, I think Sullivan felt obligated to ensure this way of living was remembered when Cardiff began to change at the turn of the century. To him, the “real Cardiff” was “made by coal and ships… and seamen who were known all over the world”. Now, he thought “most of it is gone, to be replaced with iron cones, traffic signs on their sides, purporting to represent Cardiff’s past” (likely a reference to Splott’s Magic Roundabout).

Motivated to keep Cardiff’s past alive, Sullivan turned to educating the youth. Using his art of Cardiff’s docks, ships, and people, he taught the next generation about their past. He made over 900 visits to Cardiff’s schools, all on a voluntary basis. Ultimately, I believe this was out of respect for those who came before him, the thousands of hardworking seamen who, like his uncle, worked and died at sea. 

Keiran Long

An Artist’s perspective

 Jack Sullivan demonstrates a mastery in capturing the movement and expression of people. In his paintings, the streets and docks are alive with people, conversations,

Equally compelling, however, is another dimension of his work. As an artist, I am drawn to the way he interlaces time and space: ghostly seamen traverse streets transformed by history, while moments from different times unfold side by side in the same piece of work. If his vivid fidelity to reality and memory forms the bedrock of his art, it is his interpretation of reality that opens a window into his own vision of the docks. By putting together different times and places like fragments of a puzzle, he constructs a narrative in his own, unique way. This is the aspect I cherish most: the way still images seem to flow, telling their stories as if history itself were happening on the canvas.

Anthea Ji