What’s it got to do with me?
A photographic exhibition that’s part of a wider installation which spans across both Oriel Colwyn and Colwyn Bay’s Coed Pella building.
What’s it got to do with me? began as a simple question — but one that carries real weight. It is a question often asked when conversations about racism feel distant or unrelated.
If it is explored through lived experience, making, and listening, it becomes real. If anti-racism is only discussed as a headline or a policy, it can feel distant, this exhibition challenges that distance.
Pupils and staff at Ysgol Aberconwy decided not to argue with that question, or tidy it away, but to follow it.
Through photography, GCSE and A Level pupils explore the idea that anti-racism is relevant to everyone, regardless of heritage, background, or personal experience. Racism is not only an issue for those who experience it directly; it is a shared responsibility. Each person has a role to play in noticing, questioning, and challenging inequality.
Inspiration for the project also came from the Welsh word Cynefin — a concept that describes a deep sense of belonging, connection, and place. Cynefin reminds us that everyone has the right to feel they belong where they live, learn, and grow.
Pupils developed their work through local photoshoots including Conwy Harbour, and studio-based portrait sessions using professional lighting. Using DSLR cameras, some experimented with shutter speed to explore movement.
Images were then digitally edited in Adobe Photoshop, where pupils created multi-exposures, layered photographs, altered colour, and added text to build meaning and narrative.
Together, these works ask viewers to pause, reflect, and reconsider:
If racism exists in our communities, what hasn’t it got to do with me?
Visit the other parts of the exhibition at Coed Pella between 9am-5pm Monday-Friday which contuinues until Friday 1st May. Photographs will be displayed here at Oriel Colwyn until 14th March, when they will then be incorporated into the Coed Pella exhibition space for the remainder of the show.
