Events Calendar
Spirit of the Age
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Tom Hunter
Date: 29th May 10
Time: 10:00AM - 4:00PM
Location: Birmingham
Postcode:
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Email:
Phone: 020 8360 7996
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Type: Lecture
Group: Contemporary
Spirit of the Age
A Contemporary Group Event
After the success of ‘Brilliance of Photography’ at Cheltenham in May 2009, the Contemporary Group are pleased to announce the next forthcoming weekend event, ‘Spirit of the Age’. It will be held at Birmingham City University North Campus at Parry Barr, Birmingham on the 29th and 30th May 2010. Facilities include a tiered seating lecture theatre, meeting and display hall, refectory and Costa coffee bar.
Saturday: 10.00am – 5.30pm and Sunday 10.00am – 4pm, with the option of attending dinner on the Saturday evening plus looking at attendees work and with a book sales table, until 10.00 pm. This dinner and evening is also open to partners of attendees, who may not be attending the daytime events.
The following have accepted our invitation to speak on this occasion.
Ian Beesley, www.ianbeesley.com
Born in Bradford in 1954, Ian graduated with a double distinction in editorial and documentary photography at Bournemouth & Poole college and was the recipient of a Kodak Scholarship for Social Documentation. He has worked as a freelance documentary photographer ever since. His work is exhibited regularly both here and abroad. Portfolios of his work are held in the collections of the Arts Council of GB, the National Media Museum, the National Museum of Coal Mining, the National Museum of Labour History, The Imperial War Museum and the collections of Bradford, Leeds, Oldham, Preston, Salford and Stockport Art Galleries. He is Senior Lecturer for the MA in International Photojournalism, Documentary and Travel Photography at the University of Bolton
Joy Gregory,www.joygregory.co.uk
Joy Gregory’s photography is influenced by a combination of race, history, gender and aesthetics. Whilst social and political issues are integral to her practice, Joy describes her aesthetic as ‘traditional’ and rooted in the concepts of ‘truth and beauty’. Addressing topics such as South African apartheid in the ‘Hand Bag Project’, gender and beauty in ‘Girl Thing’ and the role of desire in ‘The Cinderella Stories’, she offers a unique critique, which makes these subjects real. Born in England to parents of Jamaican origin, Joy Gregory attended the Royal College of Art where she was awarded a Masters in Photography in 1986. Recent solo shows include Accessory, Angel Row Gallery, Nottingham (2005); Language of Flowers Zelda Cheatle Gallery, London (2004) plus many more. Her work is featured in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia and Yale University, New Haven. She is the Senior Lecturer in Photography at the London College of Communications, University of the Arts.
Brian Griffin, www.briangriffin.co.uk
Born in Birmingham 1948, he studied photography at Manchester Polytechnic in 1964-9. Brian has undertaken photographic wok over many years, one recent project covering the construction of the High Speed Rail 1 , exhibited in 2007. An ongoing project concerns man’s finite existence upon earth. He works in both stills and film. Refer to his website for his numerous other exhibitions and activities.
Tom Hunter, www.tomhunter.org
Tom Hunter was born in Dorset in 1965. He studied Photography A-level at night school, which he followed with a first class degree at the London College of Printing (now Communications). In 1997 he received a master’s degree from the Royal College of Art and was awarded the Painter-Stainers Photography Prize at the RCA. In 1998 Tom received the John Kobal Photography Portrait Award at the National Portrait Gallery with ‘Woman reading a Possession Order’. His work has been shown in exhibitions throughout the world, including Dublin, New York, The Netherlands, Lithuania, Toronto and Tokyo. He received the John Kobal Book Award in 2003 and currently lives and works in Hackney. He is the first photographer to have a one-man show at London’s National Gallery and a series of his large images are currently showing in the foyer of the Museum of London.
Greg Lucas
Born in the 60’s and ejected from school in 1982, Greg’s only ambition was to never work a five-day week. His first exhibition Strange Days Indeed, at the age of 20, led to Image and Exploration, Some directions in British Photography 1980/85 at the Photographers Gallery in London. Since 1987 the live slide performance has been his art form – in Universities and Theatres, Art Galleries and Comedy Clubs. Mrs. Sharpe’s Cracks, published in 1996 contains image/narratives from the performance and exhibition: My Photographs Don’t Stand Up For Themselves! So I Have To Stand-up For Them. He has had a number of exhibitions with his partner Dizzy Howard, including Trespassing On Private Rocks which toured nationally. Greg is a photographic lecturer at De Montfort University in Leicester. His photographic meditations effortlessly fuse photographic fiction and fable as he obliquely questions the notion of documentary truth and subjective narrative.
Jenny Mathews, www.jennymphoto.com
Jenny Matthews is a documentary photographer working with Network Photographers. Since 1982 she has been working on a worldwide project looking at women and war. She studied at the University of Sussex and then worked for the British Council in Brazil. Since 1982 she has worked as a photographer, documenting social issues in Britain and abroad. She has worked extensively in Latin America, the Middle East, Africa and Asia for all the major development organizations. Her photographs have been published in magazines and newspapers around the world. Her book Women and War was published in 2003 by Mets and Shilt in Holland, Pluto Press in UK and University of Michigan in USA. It was short-listed for the John Kobal book award and was highly commended
Simon Roberts, www.simoncroberts.com
Simon Roberts, born 1974, graduated with a first class BA Hons. degree in Human Geography from The University of Sheffield (1996). His photographs have been exhibited widely. In recognition for his work, Roberts has received several awards including the Vic Odden Award from the Royal Photographic Society (2007). His book ‘Motherland’ was published, by Chris Boot in 2007 to critical acclaim. His second book ‘We English’ was published in September 2009. Chris is represented by The Photographers’ Gallery in London and the Klompching Gallery in New York. Chris states in the Guardian on 22 August 2009 - “Motherland is a book exploring the Russians\\\' attachment to their homeland. This attachment to place was somewhat mysterious - simultaneously profound and banal – and it led me to think about my own sense of belonging and memory, identity and place. We English became another journey, not quite as epic as that across Russia, but involving a 1993 Talbot Express Swift Capri motor-home, my pregnant wife, our two-year-old daughter and a 5x4 large-format camera”. We English is being exhibited in several galleries in the UK and in the USA, including the Photographers Gallery and the National Media Museum.
Helen Sear
Helen Sear is Reader in Photography and Fine Art Practice at the European Centre for Photographic Research. Her photographs became widely known in the 1991 British Council exhibition, De-Composition:Constructed Photography in Britain, which toured Latin America and Eastern Europe. Born in England in 1955 she continues to explore ideas of vision, touch, and the representation of the nature of experience, combining drawing, lens based media and digital technologies. In 1993 Helen received an Abbey Award at the British School at Rome and recent exhibitions include Grounded, an Impressions Gallery touring show, Inside the view (part one) in Tarbes France and Spot at the Yard Gallery Nottingham. A 90 page book, Twice was published by Zelda Cheatle Press in 2002 and she was a selected artist for Britain in Photo Espagna in 2003. She teaches at Newport School of Art, Media and Design. Lecturing on BA(Hons) Fine Art, BA(Hons) Documentary Photography, MA/MFA Documentary Photography.
This unique event should be of major interest to photographers with a wide range of interests, and will be open to all, whether or not they are RPS members. You are invited to express your interest in attending and to reserve a place as numbers are expected to be limited. A booking form is with this programme, is available on request or can be downloaded from the website of the Contemporary Group www.rpscontemporary.org
Local accommodation is available if required, convenient hotels being the Premier Inn, Great Barr (tel 0870 1112952) and the Holiday Inn, Great Barr (tel 0871 4234931), both close to exit 7 of the M6, approximately 4 miles north of the University Campus on the A34. A bus service runs between Great Barr and the campus at Perry Barr. Concessionary rates are available at the Holiday Inn, quoting BCU Corporate rate. The college campus is within short walking distance from Perry Barr rail station, served by frequent trains from Birmingham New Street.
Contact – Avril Harris, Group events organiser,
92 Old Park Ridings, Grange Park, London, N21 2ES
(email avrilrharris@blueyonder.co.uk )