She Sells Shellfish is a collage of two Welsh women’s lives with those of the distant past. Archival footage meets contemporary black and white super 8, in a curious exploration of the female cockle gatherers of South Wales and the surprising secrets shellfish and seaweed hold for our oceans’ health.Amidst the bustle of a day in Swansea Market, Carol recounts memories of her childhood and her great-grandmother who worked on the sand flats until her 80s. Meanwhile, on an ocean farm off the coast of St Davids, Meg harvests rope-grown seaweeds and sorts through oysters, sharing her affinity and intimate understanding of the Welsh coast. Meg and Carol allow the cockle gatherers’ feminist legacy to live on, this historical relationship between women, shellfish and seaweed evolving into the present with greater ecological significance.Included in the film are 35mm stills developed in seaweed, as a replacement for darkroom chemicals, imbuing the Welsh sea directly into the film.

Welsh director Lily Tiger notes: 'Growing up in West Wales, I had known about the cockle pickers since I was a child. Their images are often reproduced on postcards and trinkets in museum gift shops, but it was my mum who had reminded me that they might be of interest when I read her the film pitch. After discovering the beautiful photographs and interviews with the cockle women at the National Library in Aberystwyth and the archival films from the British Pathe, it was clear that their deeply entangled feminist history with the Welsh coastline had to play a part in the film. Deciding to include the archival footage prompted me to contact Sîon who’s a director and dop working in super 8mm. I wanted to create a seamless blend between archive and modern footage; the past and present echoing each other. Opting for purely black and white footage allowed me experiment with developing the film using seaweed as an alternative to dark room developers (which is most successful with black and white film). I’d found out it was possible through Julia Parks’ film practice. She very kindly shared with me some of her experiments and notes in seaweed developer making. I also knew that it was possible in still photography because Ed Thomas, a local photographer and friend in Cardigan had achieved stunning results using seaweed in his still images, so I contacted him to guide me through the process; it was a dive into the deep end for both of us attempting to use it on 50ft reels.I edited the film with my friend Tom at the helm. We sat for hours and hours figuring out the film’s structure, cutting up the recorded interviews and interweaving Meg and Carol’s stories together. Tom is an editing wizard with a really keen eye for detail and a natural sense of timing.The opening and closing song is based on an old rhyme that I came across during my research at the National Museum of Wales. I contacted them to ask whether there was any sheet music for the lyrics and they sent me a recording by John Penry Davies of Porthmadog, recorded in 1971, which was actually more of a rhyme than a song. The lyrics could be read as objectifying the cockle women as they walk into the town after market, ‘the Penrhyn girls’ bottoms ashake,’ which is why I wanted to include it into the film; as a reclamation of the chant and to emphasise the cockle women’s incredible history directly contradicting any hint of sexism imbued within those words. Hoping for more of a tuneful melody for the lyrics, I decided to make one up by singing various versions into my voice memos app. Attending a Welsh language school and singing Welsh choir songs probably made this easier to imitate a real folk tune. I sent the best version to my sister, Maeve Bluebell Wells, who is an incredible singer and musician and she recorded it and added a four-part harmony. The tune is then used as a recurring motif throughout the film. The sound design is by my friend Camilla, who I met during a residency in Iceland last summer. With her being based in Italy, we worked together remotely. I sent her a playlist of tracks which I found inspiring, a folder of field recordings and we went through the paper edit of the film a few times via zoom to discuss its audible journey. She added her own recorded foley sounds and voice and created this beautiful sound piece which I think ties the whole film together perfectly.'