Through striking black and white photographs, the exhibition presents an unfiltered record of working-class lives, exploring themes of housing, employment, family, protest and resilience. The exhibition provides a nuanced portrait of urban Britain at a pivotal moment, where industrial decline, racial tensions and government policy intersected to reshape cities and the communities within them.

The remarkable ambition and vision of Survival Programmes continues to challenge contemporary policy on social exclusion, social values and social justice. Widely acclaimed when it first appeared, the work has since acquired cult status.

The exhibition prints were made by Sid Kaplan, the New York printer responsible for the Weegee prints in the AmberSide Collection.

The Exit Photography Group was a documentary photography collective formed in the 1970s by Nicholas Battye, Chris Steele-Perkins, and Paul Trevor. Active between 1974 and 1979, the group undertook an extensive photographic study of social and economic conditions in Britain’s inner cities.

Their work is a significant example of the development of documentary photography culture in Great Britain during the seventies.

The group formed in 1973 and developed a collaborative work method, sharing tasks equally in gathering, processing, editing, and shaping their material. The Exit Photography Group was part of a wider movement that helped shape a politically engaged documentary photography culture in Britain during the 1970s. This period saw the establishment of new platforms for photography, from the founding of The Photographer’s Gallery in 1971 to the Half Moon Gallery and the influential magazine Camerawork, as well as the opening of Side Gallery, in 1977.

With public funding from the Arts Council Photography Subcommittee from 1972, this era saw the institutionalisation and democratisation of photography, providing new opportunities for socially engaged projects. Within this context, their project Survival Programmes stands as one of the most significant documentary works of its time.