Francesca Allen

0:04[Applause]

0:12hello hi I'm Francesca Allen I'm a photographer I graduated from London College of Communication in 2014 I live and work in London.

0:24And I'm represented by East photographic a photo agency today I'm going to talk you through my personal work and mainly focus on my first book aiya first off I'm gonna give a little overview of what I do and about my work my work explores themes including female friendships sexuality and using the camera as a tool for intimacy this project called girls girls girls I took these photographs around the time I was at university the series comprises of around 100 images taken over the course for about five years I think the first picture in this series I was about 16 when I took it. And I think the last one I was probably around the age of 21 so it sort of spans over that whole time period of my life which is quite strange to look back on it was very natural for me to photograph what I knew and it still is hence why my focus is solely on women I held such a fascination with my own life and that of my friends and documenting that I feel like I was made to feel it was very frivolous to want to talk about what I knew in my world.

1:29But it became very clear that I wanted to tell the story of my own experiences that was really truly mine to tell I could never make sense of why I was taking pictures and I never felt validated until I read an essay collection called girls girls girls by Katherine grant and Laurie Waxman which I fully recommend it explored girlishness as not an age but an allegorical state of mind which is definitely something I feel resonates with me these are of my sister at two quite different times of her life and she features very heavily in my work the series went on to be exhibited at the photographer's gallery in 2014 which was a year after I graduated and was possibly the most exciting moment of my life this serious hot flash was exhibited at KK outlet last year casting plays such an integral role in my work and often the girls featuring in the photos are close friends or people I've been photographing for years many of them appear again and again in various personal projects editorial work. And sometimes even my commercial ventures if I'm lucky this project showed the girls in my work in a new light there's a lack of vulnerability in them I wanted everyone I photograph to feel sexy and powerful the work explores a sexual awakening or a coming of age and the women in the images are very much in control when I wake my work it's almost like a self exploration of Who I am but also who I would like to be I want my photos to express a sense of joy and freedom rather than the passive figure of the woman that we're so used to seeing this is my most recent personal project. And something I'm very proud of I won a project grant with British Journal of photography earlier this year. And I was sent to California for ten days to work on a brief that I'd submitted to them which was an amazing opportunity to not be in London and to be in some nice weather these are two twins Maribel maricella who I found on Instagram by looking a geotag for a high school. And this is them in in their house in Palm Springs just before they went to school one day the project is called women in California and I photographed Palmer sick to see subjects over the course of 10 days up and down the state ranging from the age of five all the way up to 93 these are two sisters I met in San Francisco and this is actually the girl on the left's bedroom outside which was quite incredible as I was in such unfamiliar places this was my first time working with a casting director on my personal projects it was a collaboration between myself and lucky Patterson from shainiel Carson casting the people he brought along were amazing I feel like it really elevated the work.

4:23And it's been I've been quite reluctant to sort of pass on to other people. And I'm so used to photographing people that I'm close to so this was a nice opportunity for someone else to sort of push my work in a different direction this project was so exciting for me to be able to photograph such a diverse range of subjects in such incredible locations these are two of my favorite pictures from the project on the left Pierson Katie a young couple from LA and on the right Audrey and nedra and armor three generations of amazing women it's very important to me that a story becomes mine to tell and I'm not just a spectator there's so much more to taking a portrait than pressing the button I spend most of my time with my subjects talking to them and hanging out. And sort of comparing anecdotes and stories and actually the moment of taking the picture becomes an afterthought and it sort of happens in a very hurried manner at the end it's actually almost not the part I enjoy the most which I probably shouldn't the way I make my personal work because of that can be quite emotionally exhausting I create and curate intimate moments with people I've just met and I try and become a part of their lives if only for a minute this is Jordan with her daughter poppy in Echo Park in Los Angeles that brings me onto the project I'm going to run through a more depth earlier this year I released my first book aiya it's published by library man a Swedish publisher. And it's an edition of 500 copies we did book signings in London New York Paris and Tokyo the book is designed by tony who runs library man it's clothbound and the title aya is embossed on the back working on the creation of the actual book took around six months we started working on it in February and then released it in September but I taken the pictures in 2017 in the spring the book is about the life of a young japanese women living in tokyo I spent just under a month with musician I an essay also known as iagoo me we were unable to speak the same language the series documents a friendship using photography as the sole medium of communication when you don't have a language in common you communicate in a very different way you end up using visual cues around you instead of talking about your past experiences it becomes a very present relationship I are being young one year younger than myself we naturally grew very close and taking photos became almost secondary we introduced each other to our friends went to parties and actually one of my favorite memories is being a I as flat in the suburbs of Tokyo and her grandma calling down at us from the balcony and throwing these like little cracker snacks down for us to catch up there. I thought it was a very sweet moment of between the two of them these are the first photos I took of aya I went to Tokyo in 2016 for holiday with my friend kasi who is actually here tonight I haven't seen her a very long time.

7:41So I'm very happy to see her.

7:43So we were there vacationing in Tokyo and we met aya we spent a couple of hours with her taking pictures in the suburbs with one of her friends and then we went to hang out with her record label it was probably a total of about three hours that we spent together I can't quite explain what drove me to go back especially for such a long time something that my now agent Luke said really stuck with me he said aya was my perfect subject I knew I wanted to make a book.

8:12And I thought why not with aya one year later I travel back to Tokyo and embedded myself in her life I want to show a few behind the scenes phone pictures with you it's quite funny about a week into taking pictures we were hanging out with my friend Josef and I was asking him what I was doing in Tokyo and why I was taking so many pictures of her and seemed to be completely ignorant to the book as it apparently had all been lost in translation.

8:49So I traveled all the way to spend a month there.

8:54And then that was a slight moment of panic but luckily she was a very game and very happy to be the sole subject of my book and my entire time for the month so I'm very happy that ended up working out.

9:11This is a behind the scenes from one of those studio shoots we did I really loved playing with the balance of studio imagery and location sometimes photographs taken on location could feel a little bit hectic there's so much going on in them and for me something about the quietness of a photograph taken in the studio counteracts that perfectly and it completely pulls your focus to the subject there's nothing else to be looking at this was one of my favorite days shooting my friends snuck myself an iron into his place of work.

9:45And we had this whole studio to ourselves it felt ridiculous to be two tiny people in a studio large enough to drive a car in this is one of the outtakes from the project I love being in a huge studio with a white curve there's something really magical about having that much space and something quite surreal about the pictures you take there are no lines or edges or corners there's nothing else identifiable in the image and you just sort of look like you're floating it's very important to me that taking pictures is enjoyable and fun for me and for other people of course. And I think I guess this hopefully this video demonstrates that ♪

10:29[Applause]

10:48when I decided to work on this project I really had no idea what kind of book.

10:51I wanted to make I just knew I wanted to make something I wasn't particularly selective at all about what I was photographing I'm gonna walk you through some of the pictures that didn't make it into the book and they actually feel very very different to the images that did this is the first picture I took of aya on this trip she came to meet me before she had a gig in Shimokitazawa and this is her coming through the two barriers and seeing me for the first time the book could have had a much more documentary feel I had so much content to work with the Edit played such a huge part in shaping the visual narrative and aesthetic of the book.

11:26This is aya dancing at a club night we would go to I took. So many photos and I could have made so many different types of books it could have been purely candid snapshots or perhaps everything in chronological order starting with that picture of her off the tube or maybe only studio pictures I worked very collaboratively with my publisher on this although from quite early on I knew what I wanted it to look like I find it. So impossible to do an edit of my own work especially a project like this which I hold so close and it's so personal it's so hard to separate your memories of a beautiful moment and also what makes a good and interesting image for other people to look at as they're two completely different things. There were so many moments I chose not to photograph sometimes I wish I could take pictures of them and be a different type of photographer perhaps more voyeuristic but I feel quite exploitative sometimes it's very important for me to defuse the power relationship between photographer and subject I made a very conscious decision not to photograph aya crying or to include any nudity it wasn't my story to tell and those moments are actually much more special kept between the two of you.

12:39And I wanted to show intimacy without using as a nudity to talk nudity as a tool to do that worked into the layout. There are four handwritten notes from aya they're referencing the change of season and the arrival of Sakura cherry blossoms in Japan a flower that is symbol renewal in the letters aya writes about the fleeting nature of spring and her fondness of the time spent together the notes are not translated in the book. I was worried about losing the essence of ayahs colloquial language but also to keep them as personal messages between friends my hair became blue I changed it with how I was feeling at the time I was feeling that I wanted the opposite of Sakura blue is beautiful and fleeting and now I'm going to show you some of the final pictures that ended up in the book on the Left we have a studio photo from that day and on the right is aya in her bedroom this is the cover image for the book instantly it's not my favorite picture quite far from it. Actually we'd used as a placeholder in the layout we tried to switch it out with so many different options but nothing felt quite right I toyed around with a lot of different types of ideas but nothing settled aya liked the cover image was the placeholder we had and again it's stuck this is probably my favorite picture from the series it feels like a perfect blend of old and new Japan as I experienced it. And it feels somewhat like a painting I think this was the day that everything sort of clicked together for me I really hope that the series tells the story of our friendship and the time we spent together perhaps a small snapshot of iers life at the time that for a moment I became a part of themes of friendship is something I hold very close speaking from my own experience women create social such special bonds together there's not very much media around friendship and instead it tends to focus on romantic relationships this was honestly one of the most incredible times of my entire life and exhausting and I'm so fortunate to be allowed to enter someone's world in this way for me when you photograph someone you're taking something from them it's an inherently selfish act and it was so important for me to get to know aya for this project to feel collaborative I see the position of a photographer as one of group both great privilege and great responsibility it's not necessarily important for me to tell the full truth but rather the truthfulness of that moment that I played a small part in making and to finish off here is a photo of aya with the book seeing the book for the first time which was felt sort of like a full circle of the project.

15:35And then book signing at Satori Daikanyama in Tokyo last month thank you for coming and thanks to its nice that for having me [Applause]