We are in, portraiture, left with two choices, the "snapshot" (a path serious photographers do not tread in seeking artistic recognition) or studio, location images which are serious but as I see it theatrical, social events in which the subject performs jointly with the artist / photographer. The latter having negotiated in the emotion, of the moment, that which will be revealed. It is not a truth sought and found or even a portrait or is it? To quote Richard Avedon..." A portrait is not a likeness. The moment an emotion or a fact is transformed into a photographic image it is no longer a fact but an opinion. There is no such thing as inaccuracy in a photographic image. They are all accurate. None of them is the truth".

Note. The joy of the AA2A scheme is that it is not ageist or sexist something that is often the case in the "Arts". The Faculty of Art and Design in which I have worked has operated the whole programme in an exemplary fashion.

A Question of Identity - John, by Richard Sadler. Photo the artist.

Photographic print