Books...From Dummy To Genius

Join some of the biggest names in publishing for a day-long seminar that will explore the ins and outs of the photo book.

Confirmed speakers include: Gerry Badger, David Gray, Andreas Koller, Joachim Schmid and Chris Steele-Perkins.

Friday 9 July, 6:30pm and Saturday 10 July, 10am-5pm

From the early history of photo books to contemporary practices this seminar will cover the gamut of what makes a good book. Over the course of the day, under the guidance of our experienced professionals you will learn about editing, constructing your narrative as well as the practicalities of distribution - whether it be a print run of thousands or a self published book limited to just a few hundred copies.

Held at HOST Gallery in London the weekend kicks off with a welcome drinks party and evening session on Friday. Enroll now to be educated and entertained in the exclusive company of this small select group.

1000 Words is told places are limited and selling out fast so don't delay. For information and registration visit: www.foto8.com/new/events/foto8-seminars

To speak to a Foto8 editor about this seminar contact Harry Hardie:

1 Honduras Street
London EC1Y 0TH
Tel: +44 (0)20 7253 2770
Email: seminars(at)foto8(dot)com

Graeme Vaughan

All images ©Graeme Vaughan

I was introduced to Graeme Vaughan when he was down in London for Seba´s private view at HOST shortly after finishing his Fd. a in Contemporary Photography from Mid Cheshire College. We got talking and he kindly showed me his little gem of a project, Warsaw - a notebook, an ongoing series about spaces within the Polish city of which he says:

"Without reference to maps, or books – people in cities become my tour guides to unfamiliar places. The work is made by following strangers as they go about their everyday lives. No-one is followed for long, not long enough for me to become concerned with them as an individual. They act as a set of city dwellers and users who define their city and show it to me. In this work we are taken away from usual tourist routes, and sites, we are led off the surface of tourist maps and guides. In the modern spectacle of the city, this notebook is a product of observations."

Vaughan studied a B.Sc. Applied Psychology / Sociology between 1988-1992 and then completed an M.A. Social Work Practice in 1994 before finally turning to photography.

He first worked as a research assistant for the offender profiling research unit. Exploring relationship between environments and behaviour. As a Probation Officer, he says he took up photography as way of exploring places. During recent photography education, he has developed a community arts practice and this current work on city spaces.

These include The Dwellings, an Arts Council funded project exploring Victoria Square in Manchester, the oldest municipal housing scheme in the UK and Identity, for which he worked with Manchester City Council Adult Social Care users, exploring their lives and places that mean most to them.

Vanessa Winship-Sweet Nothings @HOST Gallery, London

Vanessa Winship and I have been in contact a lot recently in the run up to her eagerly anticipated show Sweet Nothings at HOST gallery which opens this Tuesday. I´m just so excited about seeing this work in a gallery and feel compelled to spread the word about her fantastic project. Her photographs of rural schoolgirls from the borderlands of Eastern Anatolia,Turkey are simply stunning so what better way to help illuminate her imagery than have her discuss it. I´ll hand over to Vanessa now. She explains:

“I wanted to make a series of portraits of these girls on the borderlands. Knowing their status I wanted to give a small space for these small girls to have a moment of importance in front of the camera. I hoped the symbol of the uniform, the distance in repetition, and the austerity of the landscape would represent one thing, but I also hoped that in the expressions of the girls’ faces to draw attention to the idea of these young girls poised at the moment “just before”, The moment where possibility lies, a time where the presentation of self teeters into consciousness.”

Vanessa studied Film, Video and Photographic arts at the Polytechnic of Central London. She has lived and worked in the Balkans and Turkey for almost a decade. In her imagery she focuses on the junction between fiction and reality, exploring ideas around the concepts of border, land, memory, identity and history. She is interested in how stories are told.

Her work has been recognised internationally: She is the recipient of two first prize World Press Photo Awards. In 2008 she received the Godfrey Argent prize at the annual Portrait Award from the National Portrait Gallery, London. She is current holder of the Iris D’or, Photographer of the Year, from the Sony World Photography Awards. In 2008 she was invited to show Sweet Nothings at the Rencontres D’Arles festival of photography in France. Mare published her first book, The Black Sea, in 2007. Sweet Nothings is published by Foto8.

Reading from the foreward of the book, here is Max Houghton´s lovely, poetic description of the work:

“As we linger over Vanessa Winship’s photographs of rural schoolgirls in Eastern Anatolia, it is as though a thousand faces appear, from generations past, present and future. The face of this child’s grandmother, that child’s sister, the faces of their children’s children, faces from our own childhood, faces from the work of Arbus, Mark or Disfarmer, faces from a fairytale, faces we know and faces we could never comprehend. We are disturbed by their proximity, we mourn their distance.”

I´ll be heading to the private view this Thursday evening around 6 so hope to catch you all there!






















©Vanessa Winship

Vanessa Winship
Sweet Nothings
HOST Gallery
3 February — 5 March 2009