Burn My Eye Collective members Joe Aguirre and Rammy Narula
and OurStreets editors Joseph Brazil and Clifton Barker
MARCH 8th - 11th, 2018
This 4 day intensive photography workshop in London is designed to help explore what it means to make pictures that feel personal to you. Deep discussions on why it is important to express yourself on photographs whether it be through street photography or portraiture, and how to go about it in an effective way. We will spend time shooting on the streets of London, analysing and critiquing the work produced, as well as doing exercises on editing and sequencing images. The participants will also be asked to put together a small presentation on the last day using the photographs made during the workshop.
Thursday, March 8 6pm - 9pm: Orientation & Introductions
Friday, March 9 10am - 6pm: Editing exercises followed by afternoon shooting
Saturday, March 10 10am - 6pm: A day of shooting followed by a critique session
Sunday, March 11 10am - 8pm: Early shoot followed by editing session & presentation
**Participants will strongly be encouraged to keep shooting outside of the workshop hours to maximise time spent in making pictures.**
Participation is limited to 15 people
Workshop fee: 550 pounds (Early bird fee: 495 pounds before January 31)
Location: Exact workshop location TBC
To apply: Please send an email to info@josephbrazilphotography.com with your contact information.
Requirements
One Camera, One Lens, a lot of batteries and SD cards, Flash is optional
A laptop with an editing software for Day 3 and 4
Minimal experience and knowledge in street photography
Because this is not a technical workshop, participants are expected to be proficient with their cameras and editing softwares of choice
*A booking fee of 50% is required to make a reservation for the workshop with the rest paid on the first day of the workshop.*
*Accommodation, transport, and food are not included in the fee.*
*In the event the workshop is cancelled for any reason OurStreets will refund the workshop booking fee, but will not be responsible for the reimbursements of any travel or hotel expenses. We strongly recommend making flexible travel and accommodation arrangements.*
About the mentors
Joe Aguirre (joeaguirrephotography.com) is a San Francisco based photographer who uses his photographs as a way to communicate his relationship with his surroundings to the world. Joe joined international street photography collective Burn My Eye in 2016. In 2017, Joe was in featured in 100 Great Street Photographs, a book curated by David Gibson, and published by Prestel Publishing in 2017.
Rammy Narula (rammynarula.com), the newest member of Burn My Eye photography collective, is a street photographer from Thailand. In 2016 his project “Platform 10”, a photographic series shot on a single platform of the Bangkok Central Train Station, was published as a photobook by Peanut Press, a publishing house in New York. He also had one of his photographs included in 100 Great Photographs, a book curated by David Gibson, and published by Prestel Publishing in 2017.
Joseph Brazil (instagram.com/j0brazil/) is a working English photographer that uses street photography and modern portraiture as influences in his professional approach. He is the founder of OurStreets and DeathB4Digital and an avid patron of the arts.
Clifton Barker (instagram.com/cliftonbarker), based in Houston TX, is a photographer focused on longterm narratives within rural communities. He is currently working on a project in conjunction with MOMA Houston and Houston Center of Photography as one of the 2018 Artists in Residence for a study of a small Texas oil town. He is also an admin and curator for OurStreets and DeathB4Digital platforms.
I want to write you a letter on how and why to photograph life:
1. Why photograph life?
The world can sometimes be a depressing-ass place.
War, famine, genocide, death, misery, poverty, and suffering.
I don’t want us to be blind to all that human suffering, but at the same time— we need optimism. We need hope. We need something to look forward to. We need more life.
2. LIFE
LIFE magazine which no longer exists was all about capturing life. Unfortunately, LIFE is no longer around.
We should photograph our own LIFE. We should photograph our hopes, dreams, happy moments, and the moments which make us feel human.
3. DEATH
On the other hand, every photograph we make is a meditation on death. Whatever we photograph will eventually perish and die. This also includes your loved ones.
4. What brings you joy?
What puts a smile on your face? What brings you joy and hope in your life?
For me, that is photographing Cindy. There is nobody who makes me giggle, laugh, and feel like a kid again. I can be serious with her, but I can also be silly with her.
My family also brings me joy. My mom (umma) was the one who raised me, taught me all my morales, and seeing how curious she is (she is like a big kid) — she inspires me. I love my sister and her boyfriend, I love Cindy’s family, I love my friends, and I love strangers, and I love all of humanity.
I like laughter. I like capturing it in a photograph. Whenever we see a photo of a laughing lady — how can you not smile and feel a more positive?
5. Positive photography
The world needs happier and more positive photos. Why is it that us photographers are so obsessed with photographing war and famine? Why not happiness as well?
We need both — just like yin and yang. But there is too much white—not enough black. Too much black—not enough white. We need to balance it out.
Whatever you consider a ‘positive’ photograph — pursue that. Photograph happy moments with your kids, your partner, your friends, family, or strangers you meet on the streets. Share positive photographs with people on social media, or print them out and hand them to you.
6. Positive street photography
Shoot with your heart in the streets. Don’t just do ‘hit and run’ type of street photography. Talk to your subjects, smile, and interact with them. Share your joy and happiness of life. Give them a smile. Show them your LCD screen. Offer to email them the photograph.
Be a more ‘humanist’ street photographer.
Of course, still shoot your candid photos — but whenever possible, make eye contact, and smile.
7. MORE LIFE
Photograph growth. Photograph growing trees, growing children, or growing adults.
Photograph organic matter — photograph nature, the water, and anything green.
Photograph concrete — the organic material of man. Photograph your own concrete jungle, and your own reality.
8. Death & Life
Photograph your life in reverse. Think about your death. Think of yourself at 90 years old, looking back at your life, and thinking about how you lived your life.
Then hit rewind, and start to live your life and photograph it.
If you were 90 years old, on your deathbed— what kind of photos would you want to look at? Which photos would you really care about, and not care about?
For me, if I were 90 on my deathbed, I would not care about any cappuccino or food photos. I wouldn’t care about snapshots of landmarks in touristy foreign cities. I wouldn’t care about my street photos as much.
I would care about photos of Cindy, my mom, my sister, my family, my friends, myself (self-portraits), and some meaningful interactions I’ve had with strangers on the streets. I would care about the photos that help me meditate on the joy of life. But then again — I would also like my bitter-sweet photos of (some) pain and misery in the world. We need both to balance out life.
Conclusion
So dear friend, go out and photograph whatever brings you joy in your life. Which of your photos bring a smile to your face?
In Europe today, there are around 11 million empty and unoccupied homes, 610,000 of which are in England. Large-scale vacancy in cities is often a sign of great upheaval within the urban space.
Focusing on typical, Victorian working-class terraced houses in post-industrial Liverpool and Manchester, this project highlights the sheer volume of long-term vacancies in the UK. It is a critical reflection on the unoccupied homes in England—as well as Europe—and their relation to the social housing market.
In times past, these historical houses symbolized the collective past of a flourishing industry and a strong working-class community. Nowadays, hundreds of houses in fairly good condition within former industrial cities stand abandoned and boarded-up awaiting demolition.
From an aesthetic point of view, boarded-up windows create a melancholic, mysterious, and sculptural atmosphere. In Gaston Bachelard’s book “The Poetics of Space,” windows are described as the souls of houses: when lit up at night, they give us access to their inner lives, their histories, and memories of past times.
By contrast, these images radiate uncertainty in relation to their future, which produces a sense of instability. The aims of the project are to create a conscious reflection of vacant houses and an awareness of the constant structural changes of our cities.
