On Monday this week I attended a portfolio review day at Rivington Place and saw 2 reviewers for about 30 minutes each. First session was with Senayt Samuel and the second session was with Indra Khanna (Curators/archivists of Autograph ABP. We discussed exposure, getting work seen and published etc. As a follow up to the above I asked Indra what she thought about me submitting the asylum work to features mags which Senayt had suggested, her comment was ” yes – definately send it off, you have nothing to loose! and let me know when you have your feature in the Sunday Observer!”
Summary
It was well worth attending and getting some feedback, albeit it brief. It left me feeling as if I have decisions to make about which route I should now continue with. They both were thoroghly convinced that the asylum seeker work should continue.
Where to now?
I am thinking of this work now as a long term piece-perhaps for the MA final project. I need more images, more access, more stories, more editing, etc and I also need to try and find some interest in this piece. It involves lots of phsical and emotional energy so if I do continue shooting then I would also like to gain some interest in this story to get it published. Perhaps that should be my goal now?
MAPJD extended photo story
My morocco work doesn’t fit with the above! Does that mean I shouldn’t continue with it? gut feeling is to keep working on the Morocco story as my extended photo esssay for July then go back to the asylum seeker work. I have lots to do on the Morocco work and I want to make it work on its own as well as feeling like the work I do on it is somehow contributing to my future work…
Session 1 – Senayt Samuel
Senayt thought my previous work ‘silent voice’ that I should aim to send a tight edit with PDF and synopsis to magazines such as Portflio and Source. She then discussed my more recent work on asylum seekers (I took in B&W A4 prints of the 2 mini photo essays I worked on earlier this term of Husnu and Muawia). She commented that the details of the rooms and interior images worked best for her and encouraged me to carry on with this work-possibly for my major project for my MA piece? In the meantime she felt I should send this work to the features editors of publications such as the Sunday Observer/Times/Guardian. Advice was to shoot to send in colour images and that this work should now be shot in colour and not B&W. The edit should be 15-20 images with text summaries of the story. Also, enclose an overview of who I am, how long I have been working on this work for and give some background
Session 2 – Indra Khanna
Indra was impressed with ‘silent voice’ too and we discussed my forthcoming exhibition at The Otter gallery, Southampton (which she hadn’t heard of). She discouraged me exhibiting in places where I would have to pay to do so and suggested I started sending this work to specific galleries who might be interested, where the gallery would pay for the exhibiting costs. Her suggestion was the Bedford Gallery: ( http://www.bedfordcreativearts.org.uk/exhib-pre.htm – check out previous exhibition ‘Midnight’
She mentioned Dinu Li as a reference to look at: http://www.dinuli.com/secret_shadows/index.html
Other exhibiting potentials-The House of Commons run a scheme that I can get involved in through the local MP supporting m statement to exhibit there…On a similar thread she mentioned to subscribe to local council newsletter to find out about local arts initiaatives.
Lastly she also mentioned that Souce and Foam might be interested in the ‘silent voice’ project