Notes from a visit to ‘After the End of History’ at Stills, Edinburgh
Tucked just off the Royal Mile, Stills is a small photography venue with a strong reputation for thoughtful programming. I recently went to see After the End of History: British Working Class Photography 1989–2024, curated by Johny Pitts and presented by Hayward Gallery Touring. The exhibition brings together work by over 30 photographers from across the UK and spans more than three decades.
I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. “Working class” is a huge and complicated identity, which intersects with region, race, gender, history, and culture in countless ways. To group together such a wide variety of photographers under that banner, without a tighter curatorial focus, felt a little uneasy. I didn’t get a clear sense of narrative, beyond a kind of ambient nostalgia or broad-brush social realism. That said, there were some striking works that stood out, pieces that brought nuance, clarity, or intimacy to the idea of class in Britain.
Standout works:
Serena Brown, Clayponds (2018), C-Type print
Serena Brown
Brown’s project Back A Yard collaborates with designer Georgia Borenius to stage portraits of people she grew up with in self-designed, high-fashion tracksuits. Rooted in west London, the series reflects how working-class culture shapes style and identity, and how fashion can be both aspirational and community-based. It’s socially engaged and visually sharp, without relying on clichés.
Hannah Starkey
Starkey’s cinematic scenes of women in everyday urban spaces quietly speak to class, without making it the headline. There’s subtlety and atmosphere in her images, as well as moments of reflection, routine, and emotion that you don’t always get in more documentary-style work.
Khadija Saye
Part of the series In This Space We Breathe, which explores spirituality, memory, and identity through a deeply personal lens. Saye, a Gambian-British artist raised in Ladbroke Grove, drew on her dual faith upbringing and West African heritage to create images that feel both sacred and grounded. The prints are rich in symbolism, reflecting a quiet but powerful resistance, and honouring cultural traditions that are often overlooked in mainstream narratives of British life.
Joanne Coates
Coates brings a necessary rural voice to the show. Her work opens up a conversation about class beyond the cities, looking at how income inequality plays out in agricultural areas.
Kelly O’Brien
O’Brien’s work is deeply personal — blending documentary and memory. Raised in a Derby council house by a single mother in an Irish immigrant community, her photographs centre on family, absence, and domestic space. The rooms she captures are loaded with emotion: tenderness, loss, history, all without being heavy-handed.
Natasha Edgington
Shot on film, Edgington’s images linger on quiet, post-crash landscapes: shut-down shops, empty playgrounds, council estates in slow decline. They’re calm but heavy, and feel personal. These aren’t patronising images — they’re records of what’s changed, and what’s been left behind.
Elaine Constantine
These works feel like love letters to Northern Soul culture: sweaty dancefloors, sharp style, friends in kitchens. Constantine didn’t always bring a camera; she mostly went to dance, and that shows in the work, which is full of life, not just documentation.
Final thoughts
The exhibition’s framing around After the End of History — that famous Francis Fukuyama claim that liberal democracy had ‘won’ after the fall of the Berlin Wall, is an interesting one, but it didn’t feel fully integrated. It poses a big, provocative question: what happened to working-class culture after the ideological battles of the 1980s and early '90s? But the show doesn’t seem to answer it. A clearer connect between that concept and the photography might have helped anchor the viewer’s experience.
Personally, I think the exhibition could have benefitted from narrowing in on a specific thread, perhaps class and fashion, class and community, rural vs urban perspectives, or even a tighter timeline. That might have allowed for more meaningful connections between the works.
Even so, the artists included are asking important questions — and they’re well worth watching.