Photography as Wellbeing

  Between November 2016 and September 2017 Gary Bratchford and Robert Parkinson undertook an onsite residency in Halton, Liverpool, as part of the Open Eye Cultural Shifts project. During this 10-month period they worked with two distinct and pre-determined groups; The Women of Windmill Hill in Runcorn and the Widnes Vikings… Continue reading

Emily Fitzgerald et al., Some Time Between Us. 2016, Portland, OR

“The skills which are necessary to community projects using photography are not only visual ones – the production of the image may be only part of the process, which may involve collective debate and authorship (not easy), research and writing, design and layout processes, organisation and campaigning, and always, a consideration of the audience and how they will be able to inter-relate with the work.”

– Stevie Bezencenet, “Photography and the community,” in Photographic Practices: Towards a Different Image, ed. Stevie Bezencenet and Philip Corrigan (London: Comedia Publishing Group, 1986), 143.

Round Table: Community Photography, Now and Then.

A round table discussion with several photographers discussing the theme of community photography from Photoworks Collaboration Issue. Topics address questions such as the definitions surrounding collaborative photography practices, an overview of several artistic traditions which have converged in contemporary community photography, and the dynamics between photographer artists and their audiences.… Continue reading

Is it possible to have a truly reciprocal partnership with a community?

    To ask this question is to acknowledge the power differential between an artist and the community they work with. It calls to my mind a number of considerations and related questions. Starting with: Where do the boundaries lie between a community practice and an artist using, or seducing,… Continue reading