Every year around May my phone doesn’t stop ringing and my inbox is brimming with press releases about this year's new cohort of graduate artists. With all the graduate shows coming up and showcases like Free Range and Catlin Art Prize, this time of year, I get completely inundated with graduate work. Some of it is the same, and then once in a while you find a few gems. And this is why I love going to graduate shows, everyone is so excited and optimistic, and you know what, so they should be! I am most certainly not going to drone on about the economy, current political situation, I mean if you were to concentrate solely on that, well, frankly you’d never do a thing.
I was delighted to find out about how The Photographers’ Gallery is contributing. This year marks their third graduate exhibition, entitled freshfacedandwildeyed2010, I thought it was perfectly titled. Showcasing innovative new photographers from across the UK, the show provides a well-needed platform for young photographers to get exposure. Presenting and engaging with the best of UK student photography by graduate and postgraduate students who have completed their studies in the past year, freshfacedandwildeyed2010 looks at both the subject and the object, also demonstrating The Gallery’s commitment to the next generation.
Twenty-eight photographers were selected by a panel of photography experts to have their work exhibited at The Photographers’ Gallery in May and June. This year’s panel included: Kitty Anderson, The Common Guild, Glasgow; Stephen Gill, artist; Sean O’Hagan, writer on photography, The Observer and The Guardian Online; and Brett Rogers, Director, The Photographers’ Gallery.
The selected photographers have graduated from courses across the UK, including University of the Arts London, Swansea Metropolitan University and UCCA Farnham and demonstrate the quality and range of new photography practice. Their work will also be part of an online gallery to be viewed by those unable to visit The Photographers’ Gallery during the exhibition dates and will remain online once the exhibition ends, to view visit www.photonet.org.uk.
Submissions were accepted from students on any visual arts course across the UK whose primary practice is photography and who graduated in the past year. The Photographers’ Gallery has always actively supported emerging photographic talent, also presenting The Photographers’ Gallery Graduate Award (1998 – ongoing), an annual award for students from the MA Course in Photography at the Royal College of Art. Building on the Gallery’s commitment to supporting new talent and in recognition of the remarkable quality and breadth of new and established photographic courses across the UK, freshfacedandwildeyed2010 provides a platform for those photographers and artists who are producing particularly innovative and creative work.
freshfacedandwildeyed2010 opens 14 May and continues until 6 June 2010. Admission Free. www.photonet.org.uk
Why not see what opportunities are available with Aesthetica for photographers? Visit our Creative Works page.
Images:
Steven Barritt
Jonathan from the series Anachronisms, March 2009
(c) Steven Barritt
Anna Linderstam
The Lack of Sequence, 2008
(c) Anna Linderstam
Thi Bui
Untitled, 2009 from the series Here
(c) Thi Bui
Özant Kamacı
Pause, January 2009
(c) Özant Kamacı
