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Image © Jan Cylwik

On-line Zoom meeting held 10 February 2021

The topic ‘Portrait’ elicited a strong response with a total of 16 contributors, as well as a few photographers presenting their own projects.

Portraits
Styles and themes varied considerably: recent/historic, friends and family/strangers, at work/domestic, black and white/colour. While for many portraiture does not represent the core of their work, all photographers (with one exception) said they enjoyed the experience and the emotional connection that comes with this theme. Black and white was chosen by many: Anna’s were based on scans of her darkroom prints, Sukhy created loving images of his young sons and Jim harked back to the time of his youth travelling in Asia. Nusse showed some often candid photos of her photogenic family, and Austin finds he has a willing and cooperative model in his grandson. Janet showed some more formal and traditional black & white family photos taken in the 1940s. Similarly Jan presented a wonderful set of family photographs of his parents who had migrated to the UK from Poland during WW2. Colourising the original black and white images using the ‘Colorize’ App brought these images to life revealing his parents’ fashion-concious sense of style. Colour and Bollywood glamour featured in Raj’s behind the scenes photos of an Asiana fashion show. Portraiture is not necessarily of an individual and Steve’s images were about people taking portraits with examples of the modern convention of the wedding photograph. Likewise Alec presented group shots of family get-togethers in the park. The set-up also varied: Dorota showed professional-looking photos taken in a studio, while Frankie’s striking posed images of her ‘off message’ model were carefully lit. Eve featured images of workers in hard hats documenting physical work on site and Jim included photos of his friend in his workshop. When observing Rashida’s colourful images of potters at a craft fair people commented that the artists were posed and had dressed to match their artwork.

Own Projects
Edey has been exploring a number of ideas about ‘what signifies poetry’, and received useful feedback from the group on a range of images. Heather has enjoyed the chance to photograph the snow, as her Canadian upbringing means she finds Christmas in the England “too green”! Robin has found he is missing the urban environment following his move to Yorkshire, so has used ICM to photograph a ruined church evoking the feel of Bram Stoker! Frankie’s ‘closed for business’ photographs of empty local pubs, bars and barbers provide both a social commentary on the current restrictions and on today’s interior décor and styling.


Edith Templeton


Anna Lerner


Eve Milner


Frankie McAllister


Jim Paterson


Janet Nabney


Austin Guest


Steve Jones


Robin Barr


Alec Wylie


Jan Cylwik