Blogs

The photographer Paul Lowe has died, aged 61 years. Professor Paul Lowe was an award-winning photographer and a Professor of Conflict, Peace, and the Image at London College of Communication. He was also an author, critic and educator. His work was widely published and his work is represented by Panos Pictures. Paul has covered breaking news across the world – including the fall of the Berlin Wall, Nelson Mandela’s release, famine in Africa, the conflict in the former Yugoslavia and the destruction of Grozny.

He was a consultant to the World Press Photo foundation in Amsterdam, advising online education of professional photojournalists in the majority world. Paul's book Bosnians, documenting 10 years of the war and post-war situation in Bosnia, was published in April 2005 by Saqi books. 

See a tribute from Max Houghton here: https://www.1854.photography/2024/10/tribute-paul-lowe/
and https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2024/oct/24/photographer-paul-lowes-life-in-pictures

Grace Lau's Chinese portrait studio has been on a memorable journey through Hastings, Southampton, London, Eastbourne, finishing this year at St Leonards on Sea. This exhibition shows a selection of the portraits captured on route. The portrait studio was made of ‘mock’ traditional Chinese furniture, with a decorative backdrop and accessories. Grace Lau acted as Creative Director, alongside photographer Richard Chung. People were asked to pose in a similar manner to Victorian studio portraits. However, in contrast to the historical setting, those having their portraits taken were encouraged to keep their modern-day accessories, such as mobile phones, shopping bags, and clothing.

“Through this project I am making an oblique comment on Imperialist visions of the ‘exotic’ Chinese and, by reversing roles, I have become the Imperialist photographer documenting my exotic subjects in the south of England.” (Grace Lau 2006)

"21st Century Types demonstrated, in a powerful visual way, the diversity of British in the 21st century. These rich many layered opulent portraits made by a Chinese born feminist photographer are a monument to place, race, people and the passing of time, and a direct political comment of the uses of photography as propaganda. Grace’s positioning of herself as an outsider photographer, drawn to photograph the procession of ‘types’ that pass in front of her camera, was essentially performative - acting the part of the stern Chinese studio portraitist who would not allow her subjects to smile, she creates a theatre of photography in which the émigrè’s drama is played out." (Prof. Val Williams 2019)

This project was funded by Art Council England and supported by John Hansard Gallery.

Portraits in a Chinese Studio. An exhibition of portraits by Grace Lau
Solaris Print, 76 Norman Rd, St Leonards-on-Sea, TN38 0EJ
9 November -21 December, 2024
See: https://www.solarisprint.co.uk/

Photography entered the museum shortly after its invention in the 19th century, serving as a reproduction tool, a scientific process, a printmaking method, and an expressive medium. However, precisely because of these multiple functions, photography’s accommodation posed challenges then, as it does now with the mutable nature of contemporary “post-photographic,” born-digital images.  

This conference seeks to examine the past, current, and future positioning of photography and its rich histories within museums. It aims to bring together curators, museum workers, archivists, artists, scholars, and researchers across disciplines, such as art history, visual culture, photography, museum, curating and archival studies, to explore international shifts in museum practices and their implications for global photographic cultures.  

Key questions and issues include, but are not limited to:  

• In an era of “massification” of images, how can museums collect analogue and born-digital photography strategically to create relevant and sustainable photographic collections for the future?
• In what ways institutional practices—in terms of collecting, accessioning, documentation, preservation, and accessibility—need to be adapted or what new methods are required to accommodate different types of photographic images, including “networked images” and “computational photography,” in museum collections?
• How can photography’s vernacular cultures be collected and displayed in the physical and virtual museum?
• How can normative exhibition practices be adapted to engage diverse transnational publics, online and on site?
• How can photography be used as an accessible vehicle within the museum to consider broader social and political issues and processes?
• How can museum practices facilitate a two-way interaction with audiences, enabling them to acquire agency in influencing what the museum does as a social site?
• In what ways can photography within the museum context contribute to the decolonisation process for its audiences?
• What does an inclusive transnational history of photography look like?
• How may commissioning expand an institution’s discursive space?  

Speakers: 

Shahidul Alam, Photojournalist, Human Rights Activist, Founder of Drik, Pathshala and Chobi Mela (and Visiting Professor, Northern Centre of Photography, FESCI (Bangladesh)
Martin Barnes, Senior Curator, Photography, V&A South Kensington (UK)  
Michela Bresciani, Curator, Ecomuseo Urbano Metropolitano Milano Nord - EUMM (Italy) 
Briony Carlin, Lecturer in Contemporary Art Curation, Newcastle University (UK) 
Angela Cheung, Post-Doctoral Research Associate, SOAS (UK) 
Giuseppe Chiavaroli, PhD Researcher, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia (Italy) 
Agnese Ghezzi, Postdoctoral Researcher, LYNX - Center for the Interdisciplinary Analysis of Images, Contexts, Cultural Heritage, IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca (Italy) 
Fabrizio Gitto, PhD Researcher, University of Italian Switzerland and Research Fellow, LYNX - Center for the Interdisciplinary Analysis of Images, Contexts, Cultural Heritage, IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca (Italy) 
Sze Ying Goh, Curator, National Gallery Singapore (Singapore) 
Alexandra Gow, PhD Researcher, University for the Creative Arts/National Galleries Scotland (UK) 
Lucia Halder, Head of the Photography Collection, Rautenstrauch-Joest Museum (Germany) 
John Kippin, Artist and Professor Emeritus in Photography, Northern Centre of Photography, FESCI (UK) 
Jayne Knight, PhD Researcher, University of Brighton/National Science and Media Museum (UK) 
Sandra Križić Roban, Senior Scientific Advisor in Tenure, Institute of Art History, Zagreb (Croatia) 
Carol McKay, Independent curator and writer (Associate Head of School (Arts), University of Sunderland to October 2024) (UK), paper with Amanda Ritson, Curator and Project Manager, NEPN at University of Sunderland (UK) 
Daniel Palmer, Professor of Contemporary Art and Cultural Theory and Associate Dean of Research and Innovation, RMIT University (Australia) 
Christina Riggs, Professor (History of Visual Culture), Durham University (UK) 
Colin Robins, Photographer and Lecturer in Photography, Plymouth University (UK)
Katrina Sluis, Associate Professor and Head of Photography and Media Arts, The Australian National University (Australia) 
Baiba Tetere, Lecturer in Social Sciences, Riga Stradins University (Latvia) 
Oliver Udy, Photographer and Head of Photography, Falmouth University (UK) 
Liz Wells, Independent Writer and Curator, Professor Emeritus in Photographic Culture, University of Plymouth (UK) 

The conference is part of the Museum Dialogues, a 12-month research networking programme which aspires to transcend the disciplinary boundaries of art history, visual culture, photography, new media, museum and curating studies and bridge theory and practice. It seeks to unite scholars, archivists, curators, museum workers, and artists from across the globe with a view to developing a comprehensive understanding and exchange of innovative solutions, inquiries, and practical challenges relating to the exhibition, collection and interpretation of photography. 

Supported by UKRI/Arts and Humanities Research Network and University of Sunderland.  

Conference and Project Team 
Principal Investigator: Professor Alexandra Moschovi, Professor of Photography and Curating, Northern Centre of Photography, University of Sunderland
Co-Investigator:  Dr Iro Katsaridou, Assistant Professor, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki 
International partner: Matteo Balduzzi, Curator, Museo di Fotografia Contemporanea, Cinisello Balsamo, Milan, Italy.  
 
Steering group member: Emeritus Professor Arabella Plouviez, University of Sunderland

UoS Coordinator: Amanda Ritson, Programme Manager of NEPN (North East Photography Network), Northern Centre of Photography, University of Sunderland

Technical Support: Michael Daglish, Senior Technician (Photography), University of Sunderland

Photography and the Museum 
Re-evaluating the Past, Capturing the Present, Anticipating the Future 
Friday 22, Saturday 23 and Sunday 24 November 2024 
University of Sunderland and Online 
Registration is now open here.

The Prix Pictet photography prize which hatnesses the power of photographyto draw global attention to issues of sustainability, has announced a five-year partnership with the V&A Museum, London. The Museum, which has hosted recent awards ceremonies, will host the awards ceremony and shortlist exhibition for the next five cycles of the Prix Pictet. The first exhibition in this series will take place from 26 September-19 October 2025 in the Museum’s Photography Centre. Additionally, one of the galleries in the Centre will be renamed ‘The Pictet Gallery’ in January 2025, in recognition of the Pictet Group's support for photography.

The Prix Pictet has staged over 150 shortlist exhibitions in many major cities of the world with visitor numbers of over one million. The ten Prix Pictet winners to date are Benoit Aquin, Nadav Kander, Mitch Epstein, Luc Delahaye, Michael Schmidt, Valérie Belin, Richard Mosse, Joana Choumali, Sally Mann and most recently Gauri Gill.

Duncan Forbes, Head of Photography at the V&A, said, "The Photography Centre at V&A is the largest space in the UK dedicated to a permanent photography collection, and we’re delighted that with the support of Prix Pictet the Museum will continue to celebrate photography’s many histories and explore its extensive impact on our lives.”

Separately, the Prize has announced that V&A Trustee Zewditu Gebreyohanes will join judging panel for Storm. Gebreyohanes was appointed a trustee of the V&A in 2022. She is a Senior Researcher at the right-leaning think tank The Legatum Institute. Prior to this she was Director of the pressure group Restore Trust which attempted to influence the direction of the National Trust. Between 2021 and 2022 she worked at the right-wing think tank Policy Exchange, where she was Head of the History Matters Project: a policy unit focussing on the preservation of British history and heritage.

See: https://prix.pictet.com/ and  https://prix.pictet.com/in-focus/zewditu-gebreyohanes-to-join-the-prix-pictet-judging-panel-for-s

The PhotoLondon resource - PhotoLondon.org.uk - which has been active for many years and hosted by the Museum of London is currently offline. The Museum has recently upgraded its website and may have impacted PhotoLondon. This has been raised with the Museum and is currently under investigation. Sadly, because of the way the site is constructed the underlying data is not visible through archive.org.   

Hopefully, the site will be online before too long.