The fringe programme combines photographers that LOOK has worked with in the past, with up and coming photographers we have discovered through our recent open call. Please keep checking back for up to date exhibitions and events.
©Duy Phuong
We had a fantastic response to our international open call with entries from near and far, including U.S.A, Romania, Vietnam and Spain. The shortlisted entries are on display at TATE Exchange Liverpool until Sun 14th May.
To celebrate the start of LOOK/17: Cities of Exchange Liverpool/Hong Kong, we launched a digital open call: The People City, to seek photographs made in response to the broader themes of China or Urbanism or made in direct response to our programmed exhibitions.
©John Davies
LOOK/17 asked people living and working in Liverpool about how the festival themes of urbanism and exchange had affected their personal lives. What is it like to work in the Titanic Hotel, or to be a Chinese student in Liverpool?
Download these audio recordings of social historian, Dan Warner, interviewing the people who live, work and study the urban environment presented in LOOK/17 International Photography Festival.
Charlotte Tsang
Charlotte, Open Eye Gallery’s Retail and Events Officer, reflects on how her own connections with Hong Kong shaped her choices of Open Eye Gallery archive shots in the show, ‘Reflections’. Charlotte’s memory of family in both Liverpool and Hong Kong inform an enlightening and personal interview in which Charlotte touches on the peculiarities of having a dual identity in two dynamic, and at times similar, cities.
Download the audio: https://soundcloud.com/user-49508486/charlotte-tsang
Download the transcript: http://www.lookphotofestival.com/cms/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Interview-Transcript-–-Charlotte-Tsang.pdf
Derek Man
Photographer and visual artist Derek Man reflects on the intricacies of housing in Hong Kong, as documented during his recent LOOK/17 assignment in the city. Aided by his contacts in the Society for Community Organisation, in this interview Derek delves further into the city’s overstretched housing market and the occasionally bizarre situations that this can create.
Download the audio: https://soundcloud.com/user-49508486/derek-man
Download the transcript: http://www.lookphotofestival.com/cms/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Interview-Transcript-–-Derek-Man.pdf
Yiwen 艺文
Yiwen, a Chinese postgraduate student and pictured in Yan Preston’s series on the contemporary Chinese community in Liverpool, explores the simultaneously refreshing and alienating social and cultural experience of Chinese students in the city and the university.
Download the audio: https://soundcloud.com/user-49508486/yiwen
Download the transcript: http://www.lookphotofestival.com/cms/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Interview-Transcript-–-Yiwen.pdf
Vicki-Lee Walberg
A personal assistant in Liverpool’s Rum Warehouse and Titanic Hotel, Vicki reflects on the trials and tribulations of working in an old and historic building. Posing a distinctive set of challenges, the building also provides unique opportunities to create meaningful and distinctive spaces, suggesting that the very nature of the urban space around us plays a crucial function in our everyday lives.
Download the audio: https://soundcloud.com/user-49508486/vicki-leewalberg
Download the transcript: http://www.lookphotofestival.com/cms/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Interview-Transcript-–-Vicki-Walberg.pdf
Paul Jones
Using LOOK17’s Building the Civic exhibition as a point of departure, Paul Jones, senior lecturer in sociology, social policy and criminology at the University of Liverpool, discusses some of the most pressing issues facing the nature of democracy in our cities. As sites of capital and exchange, Paul explores the effects of private ownership of Liverpool’s regeneration flagships and the potential alternatives to the current system.
Download the audio: https://soundcloud.com/user-49508486/paul-jones
Download the transcript: http://www.lookphotofestival.com/cms/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Interview-Transcriot-Paul-Jones.pdf
© Benjamin McDonnell
Open Cities is an interactive piece of music. As the participant walks around a short loop of Albert Dock, eight compositions, each based on the dimensions of colonial buildings on a corresponding route in Hong Kong are played. The music disrupts and punctures, revealing the city in a new way.
To experience Open Cities please download the free app Echoes xyz which is available for IOS and Android phones. Once the app is open, load the project Open Cities, this should be the first in the list of projects. Follow the map and walk around Albert Dock in any direction you wish, the different sounds will play as you change location. Headphones are recommended for the best experience.
Date: 7th April- 14th May
Time: Tuesdays- Sundays 10:00am- 5:00pm
Venues: Open Eye Gallery
© Alec Aarons
A vernacular documentation illustrating my observations on the people of Shanghai, China. The constantly developing urbanisation of the city is changing a once traditional culture and creating vastly different standards of living for its inhabitants, however whilst there are similarities between Asia and Europe there are also expediential differences.
Date: 7th April- 14th May
Time: Saturdays 1:00pm-5:00pm
http://asmallview.co.uk/cities-of-exchange.html
Visit artist websiteVenues: A Small View
Discover NEW photographs taken of Liverpool more than half a century ago, seen for the first time this year. Rolls of film have been developed revealing cityscapes taken by celebrated photographer Edward Chambré Hardman. Throughout 2017 a new roll of pictures will be revealed after each is carefully tested and then developed using techniques Hardman himself used.
Date: 7th April- 12th May
Time: Wednesdays- Saturdays 11:00am-3:30pm
Venues: Hardmans’ House
© Clement Chan
Venues: Egg Cafe
© Adrian DAVIES, 2017
The city veins of essential service wires and pipes expand as a city evolves. The photographs depict aspects of a city that are not a part of an architectural design for urban utopia. The expanding wires and pipes depicted strangely mimic the organic growth of nature.
Date: 7th April- 14th May
Time: Saturdays 1:00pm-5:00pm
http://asmallview.co.uk/cities-of-exchange.html
Venues: A Small View
© Michael Kirkham
A stirring memento of lost youth and a stark reminder of the social inequalities still faced in Britain today. Within its stout frame lies football’s romance; breathing in a different realm to astronomical TV deals and Sepp Blatter. A place where the game is still beautiful.
Date: 7th April- 27th April
Time: Mondays to Fridays 9:00am- 8:0pm & Saturdays 9:00am- 5:00pm & Sundays 10:00am- 5:00pm
Venues: Central Library
© Peter Mearns
The urban environment is becoming China’s most prolific creation with nearly 60% of its population living in cities. In 1949 the communist party declared the state to be the new church and banned religion for 30 years. Today worship is permitted and growing, one way of coping with life’s urban pressures.
Date: 7th April- 14th May
Time: Mondays to Fridays 9:00am- 10:30pm & Saturdays to Sundays 10:00am- 10:30pm
Venues: Egg Cafe
Michael James O'Brien, James Morris, 2016 ©
A selection of images spanning the last 30 years of O’Brien’s career. On-going projects such as ‘Girlfriend’ and ‘Portrait of a Young Man’ will be shown alongside collaborations with artist Matthew Barney. O’Brien’s most recent project ‘Liverpool Summer of ‘16’ will be shown, comprising of over 30 portraits of people from Liverpool. This exhibition is curated by DuoVision - Martin Green & James Lawler.
Date: 8th April- 30th April
Time: Tuesday - Sunday 12:00nn - 4:00pm
Venues: The Gallery Liverpool
© Kate Peters
The series One Child Policy shows the tiled murals promoting the controversial policy introduced in China in 1979 to slow the population growth rate, it is estimated to have prevented 400 million births and has had countless knock on effects. Photographed in rural China the murals also promote the benefits of having a girl. The policy ended in 2016 where couples may now have two children but the long term effects of nearly 40 years of population control will remain to be seen.
Date: 7th April- 14th May
Time: Mondays to Fridays 9:00am- 10:30pm & Saturdays to Sundays 10:00am- 10:30pm
Venues: Egg Cafe
© Dan Wallis
Venues: Egg Cafe
© Bertha Wang
The formation of identity is closely related to lived experiences and subjective feelings associated with everyday consciousness. According to Stuart Hall, “cultural identity reflects the common historical experiences and shared cultural codes” that provide individual becomes “one people”. It gives a hint that the colonial history and the colonial cultural codes are important in shaping Hong Kong’s identity. The aim of this project therefore is to gain insights of Hong Kong identity through and connecting the shared colonial cultural codes in both Britain and Hong Kong.
Date: 7th April- 14th May
Time: Saturdays 1:00pm-5:00pm
http://asmallview.co.uk/cities-of-exchange.html
Visit artist websiteVenues: A Small View
© Robert Battersby
This project considered China’s over-reliance on construction to maintain levels of economic growth. Pumping billions of dollars into the construction of shopping centers, commercial and domestic properties. This work presents the enormity of transition taking place in some of China’s most rapidly developing cities.
Date: 7th April- 23rd April
Time: Thursdays 7:00pm- 12:00am & Fridays 5:00pm- 00:00am & Saturdays- Sundays 10:00am- 00:00am
Visit artist website
Venues: Constellations
© James H Bollen
Stripped of anything of monetary value, the wall decorations of empty homes awaiting demolition in Shanghai are mostly left untouched. Wallpaper, a photographic record of these forsaken decorations, includes excerpts from William Morris’ lectures, placing his views on themes such as aesthetics, architecture, history, and art in the context of contemporary China and capitalism.
Date: 7th April- 23rd April
Time: Thursdays 7:00pm- 12:00am & Fridays 5:00pm- 00:00am & Saturdays- Sundays 10:00am- 00:00am
Venues: Constellations
© Geoff Brokate
Xinjiang means ‘New Frontier’ and is a province in western China. It is the homeland of the Uyghurs, a Muslim ethnic group. Over the last decade the Chinese government have been pushing a development scheme that encourages young Han Chinese to ‘go West’. The result is an increasingly isolated Uyghur population whose traditional culture has made way for modern urbanisation.
Date: 7th April- 23rd April
Time: Thursdays 7:00pm- 12:00am & Fridays 5:00pm- 00:00am & Saturdays- Sundays 10:00am- 00:00am
Venues: Constellations
© Jasmin Chong
These photographs form part of a photo book that I created on Hong Kong and were taken using my father’s 35mm camera on my first and only visit to the city. They seek to capture both the spirit of the city itself and those that inhabit it. My work focuses primarily on a quest for identity, both personal and collective, and how place can shape our understanding of ourselves and of those around us.
Date: 7th April- 23rd April
Time: Thursdays 7:00pm- 12:00am & Fridays 5:00pm- 00:00am & Saturdays- Sundays 10:00am- 00:00am
Venues: Constellations
© Shira Gutgold
Spaces For Living examines design solutions that provide people with space of their own within a shared environment. These solutions try to balance community and privacy, take into account considerations such as cost of land, security and style, and reflect trends and culture.
Date: 7th April- 23rd April
Time: Thursdays 7:00pm- 12:00am & Fridays 5:00pm- 00:00am & Saturdays- Sundays 10:00am- 00:00am
Venues: Constellations
© Chris Lee
‘Made in China’ is a snapshot into the daily lives of the Chinese people. The book project has been created by photo collective Tripod City, who document people and places from 3 perspectives to form one story. Chris Lee takes candid photos isolating people in their environment like characters on a stage to create stories, Charlie Kwai uses his up-close, candid style to magnify emotions and inject drama, and Paul Storrie focuses on portraiture, engaging directly with his subjects to create intimate moments.
Date: 7th April- 23rd April
Time: Thursdays 7:00pm- 12:00am & Fridays 5:00pm- 00:00am & Saturdays- Sundays 10:00am- 00:00am
Venues: Constellations
© Tristan Poyser
Set in Jiuzhaigou National Park, Sichuan Province, China. A UNESCO world heritage site, Automation documents how Western and Eastern cultures interact with the landscape, whilst questioning the relationship between the ‘need for nature’ theory and the recent phenomenon of mass tourism that brings urbanisation to once remote wilderness.
Date: 7th April- 23rd April
Time: Thursdays 7:00pm- 12:00am & Fridays 5:00pm- 00:00am & Saturdays- Sundays 10:00am- 00:00am
Venues: Constellations
© Marc Provins
This body of work is an attempt to find new ways of reading and responding to the city using photography. It also plays with the way much of our contemporary life is turned into data, even our emotional and personal responses to the world around us.
Date: 7th April- 23rd April
Time: Thursdays 7:00pm- 12:00am & Fridays 5:00pm- 00:00am & Saturdays- Sundays 10:00am- 00:00am
Venues: Constellations
Gemma Thorpe, Mrs Cheng at home in Sharrow, Sheffield, 2016
An insight to Chinese life in Sheffield, Near and Far acknowledges the history of migration from south China and Hong Kong to South Yorkshire, while exploring how the community is changing as it caters for Chinese international students and the growing influence of the mainland.
Date: 7th April- 23rd April
Time: Thursdays 7:00pm- 12:00am & Fridays 5:00pm- 00:00am & Saturdays- Sundays 10:00am- 00:00am
Venues: Constellations
© Michael Walls
Using a generic map book, drilling directly through the book, then responding to those hollow circles as points of departure or a start and finishing point for a journey. The random intervention with maps takes on a conceptual approach to negotiating a way round a place instead of following a certain path. Along the way documenting the social and political issues embedded within the urban landscape.
Date: 7th April- 23rd April
Time: Thursdays 7:00pm- 12:00am & Fridays 5:00pm- 00:00am & Saturdays- Sundays 10:00am- 00:00am
Venues: Constellations
© Carlton Douglas Watt
Making my way through the eclectic mix of sounds, smells, cultures and shapes I am a modern-day flaneur, armed with a camera. It is my role to revisit, to relook and then to reveal. To make visible that which is often overlooked, the everyday. To discover a beauty in the banal.
Date: 7th April- 23rd April
Time: Thursdays 7:00pm- 12:00am & Fridays 5:00pm- 00:00am & Saturdays- Sundays 10:00am- 00:00am
Venues: Constellations
Jon Wyatt, Untitled VI from the series 'Huangshan Ltd' ©
The iconic mountains of Huangshan are a potent Chinese cultural and spiritual symbol. Yet this UNESCO World Heritage Site is owned and managed by one company and listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange. These images use Huangshan’s cyclical mists to suggest a growing rift between a nation and its landscape.
Date: 7th April- 23rd April
Time: Thursdays 7:00pm- 12:00am & Fridays 5:00pm- 00:00am & Saturdays- Sundays 10:00am- 00:00am
Venues: Constellations
