RTÉ Documentaries

Badoiri - Photographing The Last Of The Galway Hooker Men (2016x19)

Fecha de emisión: May 23, 2016

Using still images and film footage taken over thirty years ago photographer Joe St Leger tells the story of photographing the last of the hooker boatmen of Connemara. For centuries Galway hookers sailed the waters of Galway Bay transporting people, goods and animals and connecting remote coastal communities with the Aran Islands, Galway city and market towns like Kinvara. Transport and fishing once provided work for hundreds of these boats and their crews but by the 1960s their working days were coming to an end and many old boats were abandoned. In the 1980s attempts were made to revive interest in the craft starting with the annual Crinniú na mBád or Gathering of the Boats in Kinvara and to preserve for for future generations the skills needed to build and to sail them. This film uses photographs taken during the revival to document what remained of the Galway hookers and of the people and places associated with them.