Having being given the green light to go ahead with the documenting of Artworks both from UHC.org and the Artworks teams, in addition to Quay News, who really seemed to be behind the idea. I arranged a day suitable day to shoot and as I wanted as much natural light as possible, time for doing this was limited as we were now in full British winter time. Luckily, the day I chose was bright and sunny which helped enormously with some of the larger interiors. What I didn’t anticipate was how long some of the shots would take, especially in the larger areas and getting the right angle and lighting to work in my favour was a challenge. As I was shooting for both the Quay News brief and also UHC & Artworks as well as being mindful of the Salford Museum brief I had to be mindful of the requirements for each client and choosing the right areas for each was critical. As the majority of the shots for Quay News were to engage with artists, with a smaller proportion being given over to the environment and spaces, It was easy to get carried away and focus on some of the amazing internal spaces, several of which gave me ideas for other projects. Some resolve was clearly needed and a bold decision; I needed clarity on my approach for each shoot, so I decided to separate the shoots for Quay News and UHC and made arrangements to go in on another day for the UHC shoot, this way I could focus solely on getting the ten shots that would serve the briefs for Quay News & Salford Museum to best of my ability. As was clear by the shots I took the rest of that day, which were very focused on what was needed, It was the right choice to make.
Contact sheets and commentary:
Here then are a series of contact sheets with accompanying comments for some of shots I took that day totalling some 700+ images…
Internal spaces: One of the benefits of shooting the buildings’ empty spaces and workshops, was that the only thing I needed to think about when shooting, was trying to get the right angles to capture the sense of space and atmosphere these areas exuded. As can be seen by the contact sheets below, these images are mostly unedited and include a few experiments whilst I tried to gain the aforementioned.
Studio Spaces: On the other hand shooting some of the resident artists and designers in their studios was a tougher ask, especially the graphic designers. The problem here is that I wanted to take my images as candidly as possible and wanted to capture the designers engaging with their work rather than my lens, this proved challenging due the circumstances. The problem lay with the fact that these resident studios were compact and closed off from the main areas of the building to maintain heat and reduce outside noise. This meant that as soon as I entered the studio space I was the focus of attention and my camera put the designers on their guard, something that comes across in the following two contact sheets. As time was precious and I didn’t want to be too disruptive I couldn’t stay in the studios long enough to allow the designers to let their guard down. At one point one of the designer even got a fit of nervous giggling and had to stop working. This had serious implications with my final selection as it meant that these shots had less potential to make my final ten.
Workshop and Co-operative Spaces: The best shots for me and the ones I found the most enjoyable were in the artists open workshop and the fashion designer studio. Because these were more open environments I found it easier to be unobtrusive and gained some really good shots of the artists working on individual and co-operative pieces. These shine through on the contact sheets, though I admit they are a little on the small side in this manner. As such I have put together a small gallery of some of the better shots from then whole shoot at the end of this post, so as to gain a better appreciation.
Summary: On the whole it was a fun but tiring day but I made a few new friends and contacts, including the Artist James Moss who asked me to help document his work for an upcoming exhibition, the pieces he had been working on were to be shown in. In addition NorfolkHawker fashions have also asked me to collaborate on documenting their works as and when they need, both for promotion and cataloguing. In addition to my documenting work for Castlefield Gallery in Manchester I was beginning to find a niche in something I really enjoyed doing and that others had a use for – Food for thought in a wider sense, in terms of professional practice and a possible career avenue.
Gallery:
Areas of Photographic Practice B 