I don't know about you but I'm always learning.  I'm keen to as well....

Sometimes it is because I read something different or new. Sometimes it's because I see something and it leads me to experiment. Sometimes I go to a gallery and am inspired...but the best way to learn (sometimes) is to listen. To listen to photographers who have worked out what they are doing and why. It doesn't mean you will want to do the same but I usually hear something in there that makes me think. And for me photography is as much about thinking as it is doing. Sure, we need to know how our camera works but all that really means is that we keep going out and taking the same picture if we are not careful. So how do others do it and how did they learn and how do they think?

So this blog directs you to online resources of photographers I admire who know their craft and are happy to talk about it. They are great photographers and not the usual You Tubers who usually get very excited about telling you things you already know (although they have their place and some things you may find you don't know). These are people who have thought it through.

Let's start with a Magnum session (about twenty minutes) with Martin Parr talking to Alex Soth (it rhymes with both as you'll find out!). Magnum have a number of these conversations online and I think they are all revealing in one way or another as they show a journey : Here is the link...

A very different conversation (and nearly an hour long) is that which formed part of 2021's Photo London between Iranian photographer and filmmaker Shirin Neshat and Nick Knight. They talk transitioning from still photographs to moving images, differences between art and fashion worlds, and the importance of the artists' relationship with their audience. Among other things, Here is the link...

People who know me and follow this blog will also know that one of the photographers who has influenced me enormously in recent years is Cig Harvey. She has moved a great distance with her work over the years and had her first major publication issued this year which was into a second edition worldwide with a couple of weeks of publication. Her previous monographs are now difficult to find and very expensive. Here she talks about "Blue Violet" with Photo-eye's Anne Kelly and go through an online exhibition to celebrate it. I will warn you. The colour is amazing and gorgeous!!! Here is the link... 

The fourth link is to two very short videos (both less than two minutes) of American photographer and teacher Robert Adams talking about his work on the MOMA website thanks to Art21. Adams has influenced me through his writing but listening to him talk about light (in the first video) reminds you what it is all about and in the second reminds us that there is truth out there, and even when we don't like it much we need to record it. Here is the link...

Finally an interesting talk/conversation by photographer Polly Braden with Vanessa Ansa on behalf of Hundred Heroines. She specifically discusses working in public and urban spaces and this links with the Hundred Heroines initiative to photograph all the streets of Gloucester where they recently moved their headquarters.  It is just around one hour but they start the recording before the talk...so fast forward to 2.00 minutes... Again - Here is the link...

I hope you enjoy the pieces here. If you have watched them all then I've snaffled a few hours of your life so I hope they made you think as they did me 🙂