A NEW work reflecting what many East Lancastrians called home before a mass migration has gone on display some seven decades later.

HOME1947 at Northlight Mill in Briefield offered personal reflections on the displacement of more than 10 million people in 1947 during the creation of the independent states of India and Pakistan.

The art exhibition by Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, an award-winning film-maker, featured a series of short drama and documentary films and an elegiac reimagining of a century-old Indian house.

That was within an installation that recreated the long-lost sights, sounds and smells of what many now living in East Lancashire one called home.

Part of the multi-media project was to capture first-hand accounts of migration to the North West. A web archive will stand as a long-term document of lives then and now and as a companion piece to the HOME1947 installation.

Cllr Mohammed Iqbal, chairman of the joint venture company that owns Northlight Mill, said: “This was a compelling experience which will keep Brierfield Mill in the spotlight as work continues to transform the landmark.”

Laurie Peake, director of Super Slow Way, a co-commissioner of HOME1947, said: “Obaid-Chinoy’s representation of these real-life stories stories helps people of all subsequent generations consider just how radically people’s lives were changed.”

HOME1947, also commissioned by Manchester International Festival and the British Council, premiered at the Lowry in Salford before its weekend slot at Brierfield.