I am a documentary-ART photographer whose practice is eclectic but centres on stories about the land and places and increasingly my self and my life. I USUALLY tell my tales through small, artisanal hand-made books.

I took my first photographs in 1965 when I was seven, with a Box Brownie but I still came late to serious documentary photography. This however encourages me to be more ambitious and determined. I am now making up for lost time.

My artistic interests are to explore the importance of place in the modern world, and also myself: my life, and the things that have made me. This means self-exploration and research into what and who I am and why I am that. This includes my upbringing and my family, various episodes in my past and my mental health. I find this exploration both fascinating and therapeutic.

My sphere of interest grows, shifts and develops all the time. My current projects are about an area of extraordinary ancient woodland in rural England, and about my own feelings for how my bipolar disorder condition affects me. The latter has brought me to self-portraiture which I find both illuminating and fun.

My practice comprises film photography, book design and book binding. Although I feel that a photobook is the ideal medium for presenting, preserving and storing a body of photographic work, I increasingly think that a gallery exhibition does things that a book cannot (immediacy, a sense of space, an emotional impact, the wonderment of a beautiful darkroom print), and that both can and ideally should work together in a complementary way.

CV

Education

  • UAL/London College of Communication Masters MA Photojournalism & Documentary Photography Postgraduate course, October 2022 to December 2023. Course leads: Max Houghton, Edmund Clarke.

  • First class Honours BSc Sociology, University of Southampton UK (1976-80) – which taught me to think about people, identity, cultures and social values, looking all around a subject to truly understand it, and to be inquisitive and enquiring.

Career

35 years with BT, in many guises of marketing and communications. Amongst many other things, this taught me about word-crafting and how to write compelling copy, how to compose and tell stories, and it taught me the disciplines of business management.

exhibitions

  • MA Photojournalism and Documentary Photography LCC graduate show Nov 2023: 50:70 project.

  • 'We Also Fight Windmills' show, curated and organised by Ania Ready, at the Oxford University Press, Apr-May 2024, and at Curiously, studio and not-for-profit art space run by artist Mills Rowe, Berwick-upon-Tweed, and on to other venues and events.

  • WorkShowGrow ‘Trial and Error’ exhibition in the County Court gallery, Kennington, London, July 2024.

  • ‘Landscapes of Identity: An Exhibition on Culture, Identity, and the Natural Environment’, a group exhibition (curated by Andreea Chitan, with Carolyn Mendelsohn, Robert Darch, Benjamin Statham, and Andreea Chitan-Woodier), at Ilkley Manor House, in North Yorkshire, August-Sept 2024.

SIGNIFICANT Photographic courses and workshops

  • 5-day course on Photo-documentary (Spéos, Paris, June 2017).

  • Continuous Professional Development photographic coaching by photo gallery owner, Francesca Genovese (2017-18).

  • Three-day intensive Visual Storytelling Workshop, with VII Photo agency (most of the VII Photo members, including Ed Kashi, Gary Knight, Jocelyn Bain Hogg, Ziyah Gafic, et al, Barcelona, March 2018).

  • Distance learning course in Photojournalism with the New York Institute of Photography (awarded NYIP Certificate in Photojournalism, August 2017-May 2019)

  • Three-day Artist Bookmaking Workshop (Tamsin Green, Photofusion, March 2022).

  • Photographer Mentoring sessions (three hours each) with Sian Davey in Devon and Cheryl Newman in London (June 2022).

Photo: Benjimen Green