Photo London 2016: picks from the UK’s largest ever photography event

Date
19 May 2016

Opening today, Photo London returns to the capital for four days of exhibitions, talks and screenings. Now in its second year the independent festival sees 85 galleries, nine publishers and 480 artists exhibit at Somerset House and nearly 50 satellite events across the city offering an intense weekend of activity that showcases work by emerging, established and historic photographers.

At Somerset House, some of the major exhibits include a survey of work by photojournalist Don McCullin, and a large exhibition of new work by Sergey Chilikov (see more below), Wolfgang Tillmans’ pro EU posters are on display in the courtyard and Martin Parr has installed his Real Food van on the terrace. Elsewhere in the building Walter and Zoniel have revived the 19th Century photographic technique known as tintype to produce life-sized portraits of Paul Smith and Laura Marling and Rankin has installed the Rankomat, a photo booth that allows visitors to be shot in his distinctive style. Below are some of the works and exhibitions to keep an eye out for.

Don McCullin (Somerset House)
Photojournalist Don McCullin has been named the Photo London Master of Photography 2016. Throughout his career he has captured some of the most famous images of conflict in the 20th and 21st Century having travelled to Vietnam, Cambodia, Northern Ireland and Biafra to document events (image above). The survey of his work is a powerful and compelling testament to the power of photography – each image is a truthful and unflinching document of war and disaster.

Above

Sergey Chilikov: Photoprovocations

Sergey Chilikov (Somerset House)
Photoprovocations is an exhibition of work by the Russian born artist that occupies the West embankment galleries. Chilikov’s images show Russian people in their own homes after the collapse of the USSR offering an intimate and subversive glimpse of the lives of liberated people.

Above

Andrea Grutzner

Andrea Grutzner (Robert Morat Galerie, Somerset House)
28-year-old Andrea Grutzner’s images of a rural inn in Saxony show the centre of a community; the building is filled with memories and has hosted parties, weddings and wakes. Andrea has shot the building on a plate camera using full focus and a strong flash turning each room into an abstract composition devoid of perspective. They are contemporary works achieved through analogue means that search for the photographic equivalent of a memory.

Above

Matthieu Bernard-Reymond: Transform 48

Matthieu Bernard-Reymond (Galerie Heinzer Reszler, Somerset House)
French photographer Matthieu Bernard-Reymond series Transform is created from images of architectural structures at hydraulic production facilities and the Fessenheim nuclear power station. The documentary photos are taken through a series of digital mutations defined by algorithms he has developed to create abstract compositions with a painterly quality. Each has enough clues left in them to be read figuratively, including a border where the base image remains untouched, but the transformation of architecture he depicts demands decoding by the viewer.

Above

William Henry Fox Talbot and Nicolaas Henneman at the Reading establishment, 1846

William Henry Fox Talbot (Science Museum/Media Space)
Away from the central hub of Somerset house, the Science Museum will be displaying a number of rare works by ‘the Father of the photograph’ William Henry Fox Talbot. In the 19th Century Fox Talbot invented the negative-positive process that formed the basis of photography until digital technology became affordable and technologically efficient. Original prints form this publication The Pencil of Nature will be on display, and without Fox Talbot Photo London would probably not happen at all.

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About the Author

Owen Pritchard

Owen joined It’s Nice That as Editor in November of 2015 leading and overseeing all editorial content across online, print and the events programme, before leaving in early 2018.

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