My Mum was born in Brynamman and moved to Bristol in her twenties, where she met my Dad and started a family. We frequently travel back to Brynaman, a quiet, old and empty place in the Amman Valley of South Wales, which five generations of my family have called home.  I’m always struck by how seemingly little is going on within the village. What holds people to this land? And what keeps my mum returning?

Y Gwter Fawr aims to show the reality of living life in a small Welsh village where opportunities are on the decline and industry has vanished. Through conversations and interactions, the work explores the villages’ people, personal stories, their writings and seeks to uncover their viewpoint of the place they call home. For most, Brynaman is known through facts and figures that point towards poverty, unemployment and a lost economy, but I want to show Brynaman through a genuine perspective as felt by its residents - one of beauty, community and safety. 

Throughout the making of this work, I have learnt of the importance of family and its power to keep us together. I have learnt of the home as not only a physical place, but an idea, of something that can be shared through generations, an identity. Y Gwter Fawr  therefore asks us to consider ourselves and where our sense of belonging resides, to look a little closer, and to allow ourselves to find what holds us together.