Auckland Project to show Boulby Potash Mine art exhibition

Len Tabner is the artistic mind behind the latest exhibition of The Auckland Project which will depict underground scenes of Boulby Potash Mine on the North Yorkshire coast which opened in 1968.

Intrigued by the 1,400-metre-deep potash mine, Len first explored its tunnels and roadways which has areas stretching beneath the North Sea in 1982.

Len Tabner, Conveyor running potash, 1983, charcoal and Conté pastel on rag based paper. © Len Tabner. All rights reserved, DACS 2023 (Image: LEN TABNER)

Len's exhibition on the mine, named Len Tabner: Elements of Darkness will now be unveiled to the public on October 28 at the Mining Gallery at the Auckland Project.

Len said: "I went down the mine to explore. I discovered it was a totally different world, rather like going to another planet or the bottom of the sea.

"I had expected to find tunnels and lighting but it was much more primitive. The only fixed lights were around the pit bottom.

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"Otherwise it was total darkness apart from my own and the miners’ cap lamps, and the odd machine working at the face with perhaps a headlamp, dim and dust-covered, glowering out of the darkness."

 "On and off I worked underground for over two years, painting and drawing. I was often torn between two opposing aspects, the need to work descriptively and convey the exactness of the structure or the massiveness of the machinery, but also the need, even greater, to say something of the unknown and the mysterious, the dark void, and the sense of being deep down below the surface, in a strange primeval landscape." 

Len Tabner, Rock shaft - pit bottom, 1983, charcoal and Conté pastel on rag based paper. © Len Tabner. All rights reserved, DACS 2023 (Image: LEN TABNER)

Work that will be included at the exhibition includes Shaft Bottom (1983), Miners Working at the Face (1983) and Conveyor Running Potash (1983), which were created on handmade paper using watercolours, pastels and charcoal.

As well as making areas and equipment come to life in his pictures, Len captured the darkness and desolation of the scene in Transformer at Interchange (1983) and Rock Shaft – Pit Bottom (1983).

Anne Sutherland, assistant curator at The Auckland Project, spoke of the joy of working with Mr Tabner as well as the "experience" the artwork displays.

She said: "It has been an honour to work with renowned artist Len Tabner to create the exhibition. Len produced all of the underground scenes ‘on the spot’ in the mine.

"The drawings, paintings and photographs on display capture the whole experience of being underground, from the activity of miners working to the desolation and darkness of other areas."

Len Tabner, Shaft bottom, 1983, charcoal and Conté pastel on rag based paper. © Len Tabner. All rights reserved, DACS 2023 (Image: LEN TABNER)