Nick Ballon photographs a host of famous faces for leading magazines

Whenever we’ve featured Nick Ballon on the site in the past, we’ve tended to focus on his self-initiated projects such as his terrific study of a Bolivian airline or his work in the weird world of wrestling. However Nick is also a super-talented editorial photographer and his portraits for the likes of the The Sunday Times and The Guardian’s weekend supplements are well worth exploring.

Nick’s aware of the expectations these kinds of commissions come with, and so is happy to play with them when he sees fit – see the knowingly pensive Simon Amstell or the cocksure, confrontational Russell Brand and the binocular-wielding Michael Palin. Elsewhere he demonstrates a refined simplicity in work like Daphne Selfe for Intelligent Life, toys with composition in his Es Devlin portrait and renders Bill Woodrow as a delightfully doleful bee-keeper for the Royal Academy’s magazine.