Exhibitions Archives

Photography Competitions 2022

This year I decided that I should take as many opportunities to evaluate my work as possible. Are the pictures that I think are good, really good? Or am I deluding myself?

The only way to find out is to get out there a let others see and judge my images.

Club Competitions

I belong to two camera clubs, Bedford and Cambridge. Each club has around six photography competitions a year. The judge’s feedback is essential. Also understanding where I am positioned within a cohort of similarly enthusiastic members is a useful measure of my photography.

Social Media

Feedback from social media is helpful, I use Instagram and 500px to share my work. The scoring system on 500px is an indicator of competence.

Photography Salons and Exhibitions

Salons are photography competitions organised by camera clubs but which are open to all photographers. A list of club salons is shown here.

Entry costs a few pounds, but each salon produces an exhibition catalogue from which you can get a good feel of what types of images are winning, and what the overall standard is. Thousands of photographers enter and the winners receive acceptances, commendations and medals.

Most photographers enter salons because these salon awards can be accrued and converted into distinctions i.e. BPE Crowns and AFIAP/EFIAP Awards.

BPE Crowns (British Photographic Exhibitions)

Each image that is accepted into a BPE affiliated exhibition, accrues one point.

Distinctions are awarded as follows:

BPE1 Crown Award – 25 Points
BPE2 Crown Award – 50 points
BPE3 Crown Award – 100 points
BPE4 Crown Award – 200 points
BPE5 Crown Award – 300 points

FIAP (Fédération Internationale de l’Art Photographique).

The FIAP AFIAP (Artist) distinction is awarded when the candidate has:

(1) Taken part in International Salons under the FIAP patronage for at least one year.
(2) Accepted Images in at least 15 international salons in 8 different countries
(3) Obtained 40 accepted images, with at least 15 different works
(4) 10% of acceptances must be gained in Print salons.

The EFIAP (Excellence) distinction is awarded when the candidate has:

(1) Already held the AFIAP distinction for one year.
(2) Accepted images in at least 30 Salons in 20 different countries.
(3) Obtained 250 Acceptances with at least 50 different works
(4) 10% of acceptances must be gained in Print Salons.

Both types of distinction are much sought after, and confer a level of photography excellence.

National and International Photography Competitions

There are national and international photography competitions of all sorts which you can find here

We are listed with Photo Contest Deadlines

This is a useful site with lots of competitions listed in order of the latest deadlines.

Amateur Photographer also lists some of the most prestigious photography competitions in the UK.

Remember.

Feedback is the breakfast of champions
Ken Blanchard

Fotografiska Coming to London

by John Gough

Perhaps I am behind the curve on this one but I have only just come across Fotografiska.

Fotografiska was founded in 2010 by two Swedish brothers and photography entrepreneurs, Jan and Per Broman. Fotografiska is fast developing into a global brand. There are now exhibition spaces in Stockholm and Tallin Estonia. A new gallery will be opening in New York. There is also one planned for Whitechapel in east London later this year. Which is billed as the world’s largest photography gallery.

The business model is somewhere between commercial and not for profit, driven by ticket sales to exhibitions and memberships.

Fotografiska has no permanent collections but organises exhibitions that rotate through their various locations. The exhibition spaces are designed to be more than just a gallery. “People come to Fotografiska not only to see great photography but also just to hang out, and we want to bring everyone into the experience. The building, the location and the restaurant are essential to what we want to achieve” says Jan Broman.

Fotografiska London

London Fotografiska will be located in the lower ground floors of the eight-storey, former Aldgate Union building. Converted by Fletcher Priest architects into The White Chapel Building. Destined to be the cultural hub of Whitechapel, East London.

“In London,” Broman says, “we are not in competition with The Photographers’ Gallery or Tate Modern. As we just want to do our own thing in the way we know best. The East End of London is a fantastic area, but for us it was essential we found the right building so that we can do what we want.”

Check their website to pick up the latest buzz in contemporary photography. Personally I can’t wait to be wowed by their new gallery.

Camera Wrist Strap

I have avoided dropping my camera so many times using a simple inexpensive wrist strap like this one. Cameras and expensive lenses do not bounce!

USA

Marketa Luskacova

by John Gough

There is now an exhibition by Marketa Luskacova at the Martin Parr Foundation in Bristol entitled By the Sea and I encourage you to visit.

Marketa Luskakova is a Czech documentary photographer, whose wonderfully gritty observation of humanity shows through in the cold tones of her black and white images. You can see her work on her website and I have collated some North East images here, and there are more on her website here and here.

Photo London 2019

by John Gough

Photo London 2019 / John Gough / Canon EOS R

As a photographer going to an exhibition by Don McCullin or Martin Parr is uplifting and inspirational. What though if you could see the best work from hundreds of great photographers in one place. That would be amazing, and that is what Photo London which is now on at Somerset House in London delivers. Art dealers from around the world, gather to sell prints from the best photographers in the world.

Collectors can be seen buying photography at phenomenal prices. Not yet quite the price of paintings by the greatest, but obviously photography is now a sound investment. It has taken a long time but photography is now part of the art mainstream, as demonstrated by the partnership of Elton John and David Furnish with the V&A.

If you get a chance go to Photo London it is on for another couple of days

Martin Parr Manchester Art Gallery

by John Gough

Martin Parr Exhibition Manchester Art Gallery / John Gough / Sony a6300

Martin Parr went to college in Manchester and his early work is at an exhibition at the Manchester Art Gallery. During his career, he has visited Manchester frequently and explored northern life. The result is a large body of work centred in and around Manchester. The Manchester Art Gallery recently commissioned him to create, ‘a portrait of the city and its people in 2018’.

The joy of this exhibition is that all this work is displayed in one big space, where there is room to look at the photographs and see the development of his distinctive style.

Photography Show Birmingham

by everywhereman

Photography Show Birmingham / John Gough / Sony a6300

Just visited the Photography Show in Birmingham, here are my highlights:

The Fujifilm stand was buzzing with interest in the new X-T3 which feels good in the hand. Solid, good grip well balanced.

The Sony stand had little new to show. Last year all attention was on the a7iii which is still a cracking camera.

The new camera that Sony did have to show was the a6400 which is a work of art if you want a small inconspicuous camera.

Canon had the new mirrorless range which has kicked off with the Canon EOS R and RP. The RP is a surprisingly small camera, it is a shame there are no lenses that feel balanced to go with it, but on the stand they insisted there were lots more lenses in the pipeline. They also rubbished the view that the sensor in the RP was less superior to the sensor in the EOS R. Price tells you that this may not be true.

Every time I go to the show I am drawn to the Wacom stand. Do I need a Wacom tablet? Is it better than using a mouse with Photoshop? After visiting the stand I was still none the wiser. Lots of research required.

Intrigued by Matterport which is a reality capture system. Whatever was captured could then be viewed in 3D and VR. Makes you wonder whether soon we might be able to do the same with a smartphone!

I thought this was a neat idea, photo boards for still life backgrounds. I should think particularly useful for food product shots. Especially pies.

I quite fancied an ONA leather camera bag. However, they are so pricy that you would need a Leica to put in it.

As it is I signed up for a year’s subscription to Digital Camera and took away a free Lowepro Slingshot 102 camera bag, which is going to be ideal for travel and street photography trips

This is great offer but if you cannot get to the NEC at Birmingham for the last day tomorrow (19th March) it is still available on Amazon.

Don McCullin Retrospective

by John Gough

Don McCullin

A major retrospective of the work of the masterful photographer Don McCullin starts at Tate Britain today. There is also an insightful documentary on BBC iPlayer for the next 27 days called Don McCullin : Looking for England. This shows the legend at work, photographing people at various locations in England, and working creating black and white prints in his dark room. The clip below is charming because he is usually so very serious and professional.

V&A Photography Centre

by John Gough

V&A Photography Gallery

When I visited the Photography Centre at the V&A. I was looking forward to something different and exciting. A real celebration of photography. A national treasure trove of the very best images. However, I was disappointed. The V&A Photography Centre is just a museum space with photographs.

The Photography Centre

The V&A Photography Centre was opened earlier this month to celebrate the Royal Photography Society collection of photographs, joining the V&A’s national collection. Both these archives are massive, and it is very sad that this national collection is not available to view. So it is some consolation then, that the V&A have rescued around 600 objects, and they are on view at the gallery.

The V&A blurb boasts that the new galleries revolutionise the way photography is presented. So I was expecting more than two rooms in the corner of the V&A with pictures on the wall and cameras in glass cases. A lost opportunity, to be more off the wall.

I know the V&A is a museum, but does it have to devote so much of its’ limited space to the first hundred and fifty years of photography. The last 70 years of photography are when cameras became more portable, and new genres of photography were let loose. Although there was some extraordinary recent photography, Martin Parr and Linda McCartney included. There were walls devoted to early photographs, but no mention of a smartphone camera or social media. Lots of Brownies, but no Huawei or Instagram

The Future

This exhibition at least recognises the importance of photography, and the V&A Photography Centre is to be extended to twice the size by 2022. So it has time to change, and space to grow into.

Around 1.8 billion images are captured each day. So every two minutes we take more pictures than ever existed 150 years ago. Essentially that is the V&A’s dilemma.

Where I Buy

I buy my equipment from Wex because I have genuinely found that they offer great advice and customer service.

London Nights Exhibition

by John Gough

I mentioned recently that I had visited the London Nights exhibition at the Museum of London. Some of the images on show are amazing and encourage you to walk around your neighbourhood at night to see just what your camera can see.

This article in the British Journal of Photography showcases the exhibition, and a new FullBleed film produced in association with British Journal of Photography and the Museum of London, which explores the exhibition through the eyes of its curator and a selection of exhibiting photographers.

I, of course, loved the 50’s images with men in gaberdine macks, smoking on street corners under gas lights, but with over two hundred and fifty images from over sixty photographers, there is something for everyone.

The London Salon

by John Gough

London Salon

The London Salon

Last Friday I visited The London Salon of Photography Exhibition. If you are a bit vague about what a salon is then this beginners guide is a good place to start. Essentially it is an open competition usually organised by a photography club, that is followed by an exhibition of the photographs that have been ‘accepted’. The London Salon is one of the most prestigious, with thousands of entries, and about one hundred and seventy acceptances, including nine salon medals.

The nine medal winners can be seen here.

Why Visit the Exhibition

For me, it is interesting to pick up the trends on how judges are interpreting the entries. What type of genre is on the way up? What type of images are they looking for? What is missing?. What is emerging and what the trends are.

What are the Trends.

This is my unscientific analysis of what is up and what is down.

Of the one hundred and seventy acceptances, over half are monochrome.
The colour images are usually heavily desaturated. There is a move to just include a hint of colour.
Nearly half feature people either individually or in groups. Most seem posed rather than candid. There is some street photography.
There are more fantasy images than one might expect.
There is a little wildlife. Probably about half a dozen.
There are a few traditional travel pictures again about half a dozen.
The traditional landscape is completely missing. There are more urban than rural.
Abstract images are trending. Especially landscape which has been layered.
There is a definite minimalist trend. A monochrome park bench in a bleached landscape. A lone figure against a desaturated background. A black railing on a white background.

However, all the images are wonderful, I wish I had taken any one of them. Congratulations to all who managed to get accepted. I loved Heather Woodhams, Wayside Flowers which deservedly won a medal. Congratulations to my friend Cliff Harvey with Into the Light.