LIP EVENTS at URBAN PHOTO FEST
3-12 October 2013
6 October
CITY EAST: liminal, not peripheral: a walk
Peter Luck photo
Date: 6th October 2013
Time: 11.00
Meeting Point: Fenchurch Street Station, EC3M 4AJ
Cost: £10
Info & booking: Urban Photo Fest booking
The Tutor: Peter Luck is a retired architect, presently a photographer and researcher into aspects of London history, particularly relating to industry and the Thames. He is a member of LIP, of the Crossing Lines group, the Port of London Study Group and of a foreshore recording and observation group in the Thames Discovery Programme.
The Walk: An area from Mark Lane in the west to Back Church Lane in the east changes its apparent character along its course: unquestionably City in the west, unquestionably Inner London in the east with no clear delineation between the two. No certainty either which, administratively or culturally, one is in whilst traversing the middle zones.
The area was closely associated with the down-river docks. East India Company warehouses stood until mid nineteenth century when demolition began for Fenchurch Street station and Lloyds Avenue development. Railway company warehouses grew beyond the city. Sugar-boilers departed. In 1885 the Cooperative Wholesale Society established its London headquarters on Leman Street. Bank office and computer complexes have replaced warehousing and are being replaced by up-market housing.
We begin in the City at Fenchurch Street station and wind eastwards through layers of urban history and present development, returning to Tower Gateway.
9 October
Retrospeculations: Reconstructing a Past to Come
John Levett photo
Date: 9th October 2013
Time: Exhibition Viewing from 18.00-19.00; Seminar from 19.00-21.00
Venue: Goldsmiths, Richard Hoggart Building, Room 144
Cost: Free
Info & booking: Email john.levett1@gmail.com
The Discussants:
John Levett is a Visiting Research Fellow in the Centre for Urban & Community Research, Goldsmiths College. He is the convenor of both the Crossing Lines Group and the Greenwich Group of London Independent Photography and organizer of The London Villages Project.
Nick Scammell is fascinated by where the photograph meets the poem and where the image meets the object. His debut collection of poetry, London: Ghost Autopsy, was a Stride Magazine book of the year for 2009 and accompanied his first solo photographic exhibition of the same name. Nick curates and exhibits regularly with Crossing Lines, contributes to fLIP Magazine and was a part of the London Villages Project. He is presently working on an experimental book project - entitled Significant Wreckage - as well as a long-term project on London's independent second-hand bookshops, Archipelagoes. Studying for a photographic MA at LCC, Nick's practice orbits memory and failure via the everyday city.
The Seminar: How can a relationship with the past exist in which memory functions as an archive process, allowing continual reconsideration, rather than as a form of entombment? Renée Green
A gathering of gatherings made over twenty years; an unfolding; a condensation (Freud) of tremendous fragments (Klee) - in this work, John Levett will respond to Green's question by way of Blanchot's proposal of a past to come, and in that spirit re-engineer, re-purpose and re-imagine his archive. Mutations of connection and disconnection (Foster) are hoped for: new lines of interpretation, counter-archives within the archive. Gaps and absences will be taken as forms of evidence (Merewether) for this new prospective past (Demos) and the freedoms it may offer.
A presentation will be given by both artist and curator; exploring the tensions between the following statements:
The archive always works against itself. Derrida
Memory restores possibility to the past. Dimsdale
11 October
A Two Way Street: Theory into Practice, Practice into Theory
Judith Jones photo
Date: 11th October 2013
Time: 6.30- 8.30pm
Venue: Goldsmiths College, University of London: Room RHB143
Cost: Free
Info & booking: Email john.levett1@gmail.com
The Discussants:
Hugh Look is Chair of London Independent Photography and founded LIP's Central London Group. His interest in the relationship between theory and practice in photography was stimulated by attending the Crossing Lines group and in conversation with other photographers, many of them members of LIP.
John Levett is a Visiting Research Fellow in the Centre for Urban & Community Research, Goldsmiths College. He is the convenor of both the Crossing Lines Group and the Greenwich Group of London Independent Photography and organizer of The London Villages Project.
The Seminar: This event is designed to stimulate and enlighten practising photographers about the value of theory to their practice, and to show that theory also evolves in response to the changing practice and (importantly) role of photography in societies, politics, the gallery; on screen and on the page. 'Theory' can seem distant and detached from the making of actual photographs but many have found that theory can both stimulate their work and invigorate their imagination.
We aim to explore the value of theory to photographers working within the urban sphere: theories of perception and 'seeing'; the role of photography, anthropology and ethnography; socio-political thinking; communications and aesthetics.
The session will consist of four presentations by practicing photographers whose work is both informed and sustained by an appreciation of ‘theory’ as it relates to their practice within the urban sphere. Open discussion will follow. Hugh Look & John Levett will chair the session & the panel will consist of: Professor Christopher Wainwright Camberwell College, Claire Levy, Judith Jones, Michael Rodgers.
The Presenters:
Judith Jones: was awarded an MA (distinction) in Photography in 2009. Her interests include social and philosophical studies of urban life expressed within her street and urban photography; particularly the crossover between the public and private spheres. Group exhibitions in 2013 include those at The Royal West of England Academy in Bristol and the centenary show of ‘The London Group’. She is involved with various urban projects within The Crossing Lines Group. Current research includes an examination of Poundbury in Dorset. and her series ‘Vacant Properties’ which expound her philosophical interest in urban spaces.
Claire Levy: RTS nominations for documentary, Claire has recently completed an MA in Photography and Urban Culture at Goldsmiths College and works as a film-maker, visual researcher and urban wanderer. She is currently a research associate at the Centre for Urban and Community Research at Goldsmiths College.
Claire’s work ranges from self-shooting director, specialising in documentary, urban photographer and visual researcher with particular interest in young people. She also works as digital storytelling facilitator for Digitales, based within the Department of Media and Communication at Goldsmiths and currently lectures at the University of Middlesex.
Michael Rodgers: Michael grew up in Memphis, USA and has lived in London since the turn of the century. Much of his art reflects personal ideas of distance, relationships, wonder, and things that are invisible. His work has been shown in conjunction with London Independent Photography, Norwich Arts Centre, Goldsmiths College, and Photomonth East London. He is due to complete the MA Photography course at London College of Communication at the end of 2013.
Christopher Wainwright: Professor Chris Wainwright is the Head of Camberwell, Chelsea and Wimbledon Colleges. He is also Past President of The European League of Institutes of the Arts (ELIA), an organisation representing over 350 European Higher Arts Institutions. He is currently a member of The Tate Britain Council and a Trustee of Cape Farewell, an artist run organisation that promotes a cultural response to climate change.