Phil Sharp

0:13[Applause]

0:20thanks little bit of branding for you there to start off with I'm just going to mainly talk about the particular project that was on its nice lap and and then talk a little bit about some other stuff at the end but this was a Street project that I started really out of sort of born out of frustration I I shoot commercial stuff and I shoot actors head shots and stuff in the music industry but as a as a portraitist sometimes it I don't know I found I was getting frustrated by um sort of waiting for a commission to come along and so I was living in STO Newton at the time and looking out my window and deciding trying to sort of think of portrait projects or places I could go to to to to sort of get inspired and and and photograph people and just you know sort of dawned on me that there really is enough inspiration just going past my window every day like there's enough interesting looking people I kind of feel that not necessarily like it there's nothing particularly like original about the idea for this you know a lot of people do street photography they are inspired by their environment but this is yeah this is this is my interpretation of it I kind of also weirdly feel like as a photographer that I have a slight responsibility to document what's going on around me as well as sort of just make a living from it and create images from scratch I kind of feel like that I should document people that that share my my my habitat basically.

2:24So I I originally decided to keep it pretty local I thought said to myself I'll just do 100 yards either side of my front door and that just kind of gave me a little little framework you know like something that I knew that would be interesting when people who are potentially looking at it on the internet which is there's a million different things to look at every minute just that's like a little handle 100 yards that's the entire distance that I went it changed a little bit.

2:58But I'll talk about that in a moment but these are all. Basically between I mean I guess a lot of you are fairly local so oh you can see that's the question mark bar now it's called like the ham something to do with bears it's a hamburger bar but it's on stake newon High Street between sort of Church Street and kind of where dwon begins basically so what I ended up doing some of these faes you might actually know I don't know if you live in this area like this this particular girl she's kind of lived there for at least as long as I have seven or eight years and you know she'll asked for Change and and that kind of thing. And I was Keen to kind of document these people and try and show like I think it's hard to not be exploitative in a way when you're doing street photography I think there's inevitably an element of of exploitation I feel like where you I'm shooting and I'm taking stuff I'm sort of I'm going to be changing the context of it entirely like her experience of day-to-day life is very different and than than than mine and now it's like I mean nice place in East London.

4:31And I'm sort of talking about it to lots of other photographers and I don't know I'm interested in how that contrast works and the line of you know you're sort of taking a photograph but yeah where does exploitation and representation kind of end and begin this is Lyndon again if you live in state newon you might recognize lynon um so a little bit about out sort of technical process like I when I go out to shoot this stuff I say to myself like it's it's work it's a job I obviously don't get paid to do these kind of projects but I I put it in the diary as a workday and I for this series I work with an assistant so he'll he or she will have a small little flash little kind of Ellen chro little pack with a softbox and I feel that serves two purposes as well as being able to have a little bit of extra light when you're stopping to ask people to photograph them it kind of legitimizes you a little bit because you look like a photographer. And I feel that's kind of weirdly important like I'm not I I always stop and I ask people if I can take their picture a lot of Street photographers don't and that's that's cool but I personally enjoy a little bit of interaction. And I like to think about I'm interested in what their reaction to me I think so like for example this guy you know I'd say oh hi I'm shooting a I'm taking pictures on this street can I take your portrait he's just like sure like and you take a couple of frames and it's over in a second other people want to know much more about it you know what's it for where the picture is going to go and generally like my answer will vary depending on my mood sometimes I've just said you know someone says what's what's it for and I've just said art and and and that qu often work cuzz you just get a shrug of the shoulders and oh as long as it's art then must be all right yeah you know. And sort of the question of where the pcture is going to end up is quite a weird one because it's like well some project I'm sort of thinking of putting together at some point I don't know is it might end up in a book or in a so you know you you sort of you you hope that the people say Yes I'm sort of plagued by the memory of the people that say no just some incredible subjects who you know who I've asked and they've they've sort of declined and it's really frustrating because there just some great subjects that yeah that don't don't want their photograph taken and I've s sort of tried to do it sneakily maybe I've done it sneakily a couple of times actually.

8:03But yeah. So so the project extended slightly I just went up to dlon started taking portraits in dlon. And then down on London Bridge as well.

8:20So I sort of had an idea of doing a project on on just people on London's Bridges and then it kind of dawned on me that.

8:30This is all the sort of same road it's the same bit of Road basically that goes up from London Bridge you know. Basically up to Cambridge it's kind of accidental in a way.

8:41But I think a length of geography is is is you know I'm interested in sort of psycho geography and it's a Roman Road so you know just as idea that there's a same people have been trampled along this stretch of road Ro for 2,000 years and you know I like photography's Power to be able to hopefully be around for maybe a 100 or 200 years these photographs will exist for something like that and yeah I'm generally shooting these were pretty much taken on either like a a Canon 5D Mark I or maybe a Sony a7r just shooting two or three fr at a time pretty quickly shots like this I mean he's probably just blinking like it wasn't I didn't say close your eyes or anything like that but out of the few frames that I shot you know it works because it's has a sort of meditative kind of element to it you know just just great characters everywhere you look really in London like you you really don't have to wait that long when someone's sort of if you ask someone and they decline it can be frustrating but you never have to wait very long for for somebody else to come along again like a guy it's like can I take your photograph he's eating a packet of crisp like he didn't stop he yeah fine like and I took a few frames thanks thanks mate and no worries and he's off like so you know and like ♪

10:26the there's the the thing about shooting street is there's no there's no way of it not kind of feeling weird and subversive to do it like I think as a photographer you just have to accept like okay this is what I'm going to go and do this is my job today and you really sort of putting yourself out there and you do definitely feel quite like you're you're you're breaking some kind of code of social interaction by asking people.

10:54But it's actually part of the fun and if you just you you know you start doing it like it's sort of it's sort of weirdly addictive I suppose and you just yeah it's possible to make great portraits basically.

11:08So I just talk about a couple of other sort of things that I do at the moment there's the portrait of Britain exhibition going on. That's by the sort of associate British Journal of Photography associated with the JC DACA advertising screens um so I was fortunate enough to have three images chosen one of which they used on the cover of this month's Edition second one of which is this one of Frank Carter from Gallows which was originally a commission for a DIY magazine and and this one which was actually a portrait of the the girl who was assisting me on that day and it's interesting you can spend sort of four five hours out shooting portraits of people. And then. Actually the one that works was the one where you're testing the lights with your assistant so but you know if it works then it works and just a recent cover shoot my studio up in seven sisters and couple of other magazine covers over the past couple of years.

12:26And then. I just thought I'd some other portraits that I've taken working in sort of Music stuff either editorial or or commissions for for magazines and then. Actually another side of my my work is doing actors head shots which is is great because there's loads of actors in London and they all need head shots all the time. So it keeps the walls from the door but I I would get bored if I I don't know I I I like to you know if I have something interesting come in so like this guy just wanted an actor's headshot but he you know just had such a great look these thick glasses and you know he was like you mind if I have a cigarette no no no that's fine let's take a photograph and so this one has been selected for the Taylor wesling this year. So if you go to National Portrait Gallery you might see that.

13:24But yeah just actors head shots are actually an opportunity to just have interesting people stand in front of your lens and create something nice so even sometimes relatively sort of torgy areas of Photography that are perceived as being kind of maybe not so interesting can actually turn into to sort of opportunities to make interesting work. So that's me [Applause]