About me

My early interest in photography was triggered by my father, a keen amateur, who allowed me to mix the chemicals for developing his films, in the kitchen sink. I soon learnt the rudiments of the processes and was enthralled by the magical appearance of the printed image as it was rocked gently in dishes of darkroom chemistry. An early departure from the education system at 16 was followed by a job in a Press Agency, photography being the only discipline that I had an interest in.

The interest soon became a passion, and a progression from tea boy to printer, to trainee photographer, could not happen fast enough. The company gave me an opportunity to explore the many different forms of photography, press, sports, fashion, travel and eventually as a photographer in their advertising studio.

By the age of 23 I was working for myself and shooting for my own clients; from ship builders to tobacco giants and from perfumiers to nationalised industries. I even started my own professional laboratory, initially as a means of keeping control of the way my own images were printed, but subsequently as a business in its own right. By the time of the recession in the early 90’s, when the advertising industry began redefining itself, I had become more interested in helping businesses tell their story in a factual but visually creative way and, by the millennium, I had evolved a style closer to reportage and documentary photography. The advance of the digital age saw very many laboratories sink below the horizon and, sadly, mine was no exception.

Over the past 15 years my commercial work has been deliberately reduced allowing me to concentrate on what has become a very personal mission to create images for the charitable sector, and work with people whose lives and existence could, at best, be described as challenging. There are frequent trips to Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh, interspersed with travels to Burma, Uganda, Rwanda and Democratic Republic of Congo. Photographing in maternity hospitals and neonatal units has become a feature of my work, along with the opportunity to build a visual record of people’s lives as they struggle to balance the intrusive excesses of the 21st century against the basic necessity of putting food on their tables. I hope my photographs speak volumes.