A screenshot of my shortlisted series ‘Starlings Above’ in the Sony World Photography Awards 2009.

The Sony World Photography Awards is a truly global competition. From Argentina to Zimbabwe, over 60,000 photograph entries were submitted this year from 139 different countries. The Honorary Judging Committee, comprising of world-renowned photographers, curators, representatives from leading international photo agencies, publishers and critics made their selection from 36,546 professional and 25,370 amateur photography submissions. I was shortlisted in the Fine Art - Natural History category in February 2009 with my series of black & white photographs documenting starlings in flight. Yesterday I was announced as one of the third place professional category finalists! I really didn’t expect to even be shortlisted, so I’m really pleased to have got this far on my first attempt of entering the competition (and plus, there’s always next year!).

Those who judged the Fine Art - Natural History category include Zelda Cheatle, portfolio manager and curator (UK); Mary-Ellen Mark, photographer (USA); Sarah Moon, photographer (France), and Philippe Garner, International Head of Photographs at Christie’s (UK).

The 44 photographers, from 22 separate countries, were selected from the 186 shortlisted photographers revealed last month. Each of the photographers on the list will be exhibited and honoured at the Sony World Photography Awards ceremony at the prestigious Palais des Festivals in Cannes, France, on Thursday 16 April. Of the 12 professional category winners, one photographer will be the recipient of the L’Iris D’Or, the Sony World Photography Awards Photographer of the Year.

As one of the finalists, my photographs will be showcased as part of the winner’s exhibition in Cannes from the 14th-19th April 2009. The work will also be featured in the 2009/10 Global Tour exhibition and be published in the SWPA 2009 Winner’s Book. The work will be represented by SWPA and will be made available for sale during the various exhibitions on the Global Tour which, next year, include Hong Kong, Tokyo, Kuala Lumpur, Thailand, Canada, USA as well as stops in South America and Europe. I also receive two complimentary tickets to attend the Awards Ceremony in Cannes on the 16th April as well as the week-long Festival.

To see my entry alongside the other photographers in the Natural History category visit the Sony World Photography Awards 2009 website. You can also read the official press release and an online article featured on Culture 24 for more information too.

Note: This blog post is an update/modification of a previous post written on Sunday 8th March 2009.

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Tags: Black & White,Exhibitions,Natural History,Photography Awards,Sony World Photography Awards 2009,Starlings

A preview of my photography book ‘Blackpool: An Unimagined Space?’

“Everyone has heard of Blackpool, and it projects, enduringly, a permissive but unthreatening image of proletarians at play. That the image is unduly simple goes without saying, and there are many intersecting Blackpools, including the residential, respectable and poverty stricken ones, behind and to either side of the pullulating, pulsating sea-front of the Golden Mile and Pleasure Beach, living out a more prosaic existence alongside the glitter and gowns of the night-clubs and cabarets which represent a more recent dominant image of Blackpool’s pleasure identity”.
- Walton, J.K (1998)

The production of my series of documentary photographs exploring life on Blackpool’s seaside fringe has undergone many transformations and alterations since I began the project back in July 2006. My approach has always been organic, free to adapt in response to the town’s ever-changing topography and characteristics. Inspired by many aspects of the town’s unique character, cultural heritage and history the project documents the mélange of experiences and ‘vistas’ that I’ve encountered throughout my daily life by the sea. Central to my approach was my desires to not only record these experiences, but to celebrate the medium of documentary photography itself.

In many ways, Blackpool and documentary photography go hand in hand. For instance; during the Berlin Photography Festival ‘After The Fact’ in September 2005, Jan-Erik Lundström commented that the current state of documentary photography is “both affirmative and disillusioned, pragmatic and utopian; is often impure, hybrid, layered, combinatory, even internally contradictory or unresolved”. Lundström goes on to say that the medium is “on the one hand, a struggle to maintain public space, to sustain active public discourse and collective dialogue, to find or establish a place where it is possible to talk, speak and listen, and on the other hand, a mode of artistic praxis engaged in art as a vehicle for knowledge production”. This idea that documentary photography has the ability to communicate, in a complex manner, the world around us is one that I considered an important notion throughout the production of the Blackpool project.

The ‘Blackpool: An Unimagined Space?’ book features over twenty of the most striking and revealing documentary photographs I’ve taken during the project, covering everything from the local built environment to the spectacle of live performance on the promenade. There is also an introduction to the series in the book that offers further insight into the approach and production of the project as a whole. Each hardcover book is made to special order and produced in full colour (measuring 28 cm x 21.5 cm). Softcover books are also available on request at a discounted price.

If you would like further information on the book or would like to pre-order one, please contact me for details and prices.

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Tags: Blackpool,Photography Book,Publications