

A Photographic Life
The United Nations of Photography
"To take a photograph is to align the head, the eye and the heart. It's a way of life." Henri Cartier-Bresson.
Whatever your level of engagement with photography The Photographic Life Podcast explains the realities of working with and learning about the medium. Each week photographer, writer, lecturer, filmmaker, and BBC Radio contributor Dr. Grant Scott reflects on news, discussions, themes and issues surrounding the photographic community. This is a podcast for those who do not want kit reviews, photoshop techniques, marketing babble or camera talk. It is for those who want informed conversation about photography and life. Grant Scott is the founder/curator of www.unitednationsofphotography.com, a Senior Lecturer in Photography at Oxford Brookes University, UK, a working photographer, and the author of Professional Photography: The New Global Landscape Explained, The Essential Student Guide to Professional Photography and New Ways of Seeing: The Democratic Language of Photography.
His documentary film, Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay has been screened across the UK, and in Canada and the US.
Podcast music: Written and performed by Laura Ritchie.
Whatever your level of engagement with photography The Photographic Life Podcast explains the realities of working with and learning about the medium. Each week photographer, writer, lecturer, filmmaker, and BBC Radio contributor Dr. Grant Scott reflects on news, discussions, themes and issues surrounding the photographic community. This is a podcast for those who do not want kit reviews, photoshop techniques, marketing babble or camera talk. It is for those who want informed conversation about photography and life. Grant Scott is the founder/curator of www.unitednationsofphotography.com, a Senior Lecturer in Photography at Oxford Brookes University, UK, a working photographer, and the author of Professional Photography: The New Global Landscape Explained, The Essential Student Guide to Professional Photography and New Ways of Seeing: The Democratic Language of Photography.
His documentary film, Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay has been screened across the UK, and in Canada and the US.
Podcast music: Written and performed by Laura Ritchie.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Apr 17, 2019 • 20min
A Photographic Life - 51: Plus Colin Jones
In episode 51 UNP founder and curator Grant Scott is in his shed considering the recent World Press Photo controversy, the importance of remaining human as a photographer, the cyclical nature of photography and the importance of not being defined by a style.
Plus this week photographer Colin Jones takes on the challenge of supplying Grant with an audio file no longer than 5 minutes in length in which he answer’s the question ‘What Does Photography Mean to You?’
You can find out details about Colin's current exhibition The George Orwell of Photography here www.lucy-bell.com/exhibition/colin-jones
Born in London in 1936, Colin Jones' creative life followed an unorthodox trajectory: From a working-class childhood in the East End of London to dancing in the English Royal Ballet and marrying the great ballerina Lynn Seymour. Jones bought his first camera whilst on tour in Japan, running an errand for the prima ballerina Dame Margot Fonteyn. Jones admired the available-light backstage photography of Michael Peto, a Hungarian émigré, who agreed to mentor him. In 1962 Jones started working as a full-time photographer for The Observer newspaper, and never looked back. Commissioned assignments took him to New York City in 1962; the Liverpool docks in 1963; the race riots in Birmingham, Alabama, USA, where he made portraits of both 'Bull' Connor, and Dr Martin Luther King in 1963; and to Leningrad, USSR in 1964. Jones is one of the most celebrated and prolific photographers of post-war Britain and has documented facets of social history over the years as diverse as the vanishing industrial working lives of the North East published in his book Grafters, delinquent Afro-Caribbean youth in London published in his book The Black House, and the high-octane hedonism of Swinging London with his famous pictures of The Who early in their career published in the book Maximum Who. Jones now lives in South West London. www.colinjonesphotography.co.uk
Special thanks to Lucy Bell.
You can also access and subscribe to these podcasts at SoundCloud https://soundcloud.com/unofphoto on iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/a-photographic-life/id1380344701 on Player FM https://player.fm/series/a-photographic-life and Podbean www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/i6uqx-6d9ad/A-Photographic-Life-Podcast
Grant Scott is the founder/curator of United Nations of Photography, a Senior Lecturer in Professional Photography at the University of Gloucestershire, a working photographer, and the author of Professional Photography: The New Global Landscape Explained (Focal Press 2014) and The Essential Student Guide to Professional Photography (Focal Press 2015). His next book New Ways of Seeing: The Democratic Language of Photography will be published by Bloomsbury Academic in 2019. He is currently work on his next documentary film project Woke Up This Morning: The Rock n' Roll Thunder of Ray Lowry.
His documentary film, Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay has been screened across the UK and the US in 2018 and will be screened in the US and Canada in 2019.
© Grant Scott 2019

Apr 10, 2019 • 20min
A Photographic Life - 50: Plus Alys Tomlinson
In episode 50 UNP founder and curator Grant Scott is in his shed considering the various skill and digital demands made of a photographer in the 21st Century and the importance of writing within a photographic practice.
Plus this week photographer Alys Tomlinson takes on the challenge of supplying Grant with an audio file no longer than 5 minutes in length in which he answer’s the question ‘What Does Photography Mean to You?’
Having grown up in Brighton in the UK, Alys went on to study English Literature and Communications at the University of Leeds. After graduating, she moved to New York for a year and was given her first commission by Time Out magazine, before returning to London to study photography at Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design. She has recently completed a part-time MA in Anthropology of Travel, Tourism and Pilgrimage at SOAS, University of London, which connects with her long-term, personal project concerning pilgrimage. Alys combines commissioned work for editorial, design and advertising clients such as the BBC, Bloomsbury Publishing, Condé Nast,
The Guardian, Harvey Nichols and Penguin Books, with personal work, which she publishes and exhibits. Amongst many awards she was named Sony World Photography Awards, Photographer of the Year in 2018, shortlisted at the 2019 Rencontres d’Arles, New Discovery Award, exhibited as part of the Taylor Wessing Portrait Prize, National Portrait Gallery, London in 2017, won the Magenta Foundation/Flash Forward, in 2008 and shortlisted for the 2003 Jerwood Photography Award. She is also a visiting lecturer at Central Saint Martins (UAL) and Ravensbourne College of Art & Design. www.alystomlinson.co.uk
You can also access and subscribe to these podcasts at SoundCloud https://soundcloud.com/unofphoto on iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/a-photographic-life/id1380344701 on Player FM https://player.fm/series/a-photographic-life and Podbean www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/i6uqx-6d9ad/A-Photographic-Life-Podcast
Grant Scott is the founder/curator of United Nations of Photography, a Senior Lecturer in Professional Photography at the University of Gloucestershire, a working photographer, and the author of Professional Photography: The New Global Landscape Explained (Focal Press 2014) and The Essential Student Guide to Professional Photography (Focal Press 2015). His next book New Ways of Seeing: The Democratic Language of Photography will be published by Bloomsbury Academic in 2019. He is currently work on his next documentary film project. He is currently work on his next documentary film project Woke Up This Morning: The Rock n' Roll Thunder of Ray Lowry.
His documentary film, Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay has been screened across the UK and the US in 2018 and will be screened in the US and Canada in 2019.
© Grant Scott 2019

Apr 3, 2019 • 21min
A Photographic Life - 49: Plus John Sevigny
In episode 49 UNP founder and curator Grant Scott is in his shed considering the selling of a potentially false narrative to photographers through photography competitions, portfolio reviews and some photography magazines.
Plus this week photographer John Sevigny takes on the challenge of supplying Grant with an audio file no longer than 5 minutes in length in which he answer’s the question ‘What Does Photography Mean to You?’
You can read about the kidnapping John mentions in this week's episode here https://medium.com/@John_Sevigny/a-photographer-kidnapped-in-mexico-part-1-c9fd4f1fdcdf
John Sevigny has been taking pictures, teaching and writing about art and his own adventures for nearly 15 years. Sevigny was born in Miami and grew up in a home where he was encouraged to read, write and make art. His father was a painter and sculptor, and his mother, a feminist, photographer and activist. Sevigny himself has never been shy about expressing his opinions on the issues of the day, and has written in depth about everything from immigration and human trafficking to Reagan-era politics. He is best known for his uncompromising photographs, of Mexican prostitutes and portraits of Salvadoran gang members. Sevigny frequently speaks at universities across the Americas on structural violence, Abstract Expressionism, street photography, and frequently his own work. He taught photography for five years at la Universidad Centroamericana Jose Simeon Cañas (UCA) in El Salvador - a Roman Catholic school remembered for being the site of the killing of six Jesuit priests during that country's armed conflict. He has worked for two newspapers on the Texas-Mexico border, for the Associated Press and EFE News, the official agency for the government of Spain. He has photographed for newspapers and magazines in the United States, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador and Brazil and been a guest artist at Benedictine University, Illinois and given guest lectures at the Pratt Institute and School of Visual Arts, both in New York; the Loyola University, Depaul University, and College of Dupage, all in Chicago; the University of Wisconsin at Oshkosh; and the University of Illinois, among many others. He has had at least 50 solo exhibitions including shows in the United States, Mexico, Guatemala, and Holland and participated in group exhibitions in Holland, Portugal, Spain, and across the United States. He currently divides his time between the United States and various parts of Mexico and Central America. www.johnsevigny.org
You can also access and subscribe to these podcasts at SoundCloud https://soundcloud.com/unofphoto on iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/a-photographic-life/id1380344701 on Player FM https://player.fm/series/a-photographic-life and Podbean www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/i6uqx-6d9ad/A-Photographic-Life-Podcast
Grant Scott is the founder/curator of United Nations of Photography, a Senior Lecturer in Professional Photography at the University of Gloucestershire, a working photographer, and the author of Professional Photography: The New Global Landscape Explained (Focal Press 2014) and The Essential Student Guide to Professional Photography (Focal Press 2015). His next book New Ways of Seeing: The Democratic Language of Photography will be published by Bloomsbury Academic in 2019. He is currently work on his next documentary film project Woke Up This Morning: The Rock n' Roll Thunder of Ray Lowry www.wokeupthismorningfilm.com.
His documentary film, Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay has been screened across the UK and the US in 2018 and will be screened in the US and Canada in 2019.
© Grant Scott 2019

Mar 27, 2019 • 22min
A Photographic Life - 48: Plus Rachel Boillot
In episode 48 UNP founder and curator Grant Scott is in his shed considering the relationship between music and photography, photography as a visual language and the importance of understanding where your work fits within the commissioned landscape if you want to be commissioned.
Plus this week photographer Rachel Boillot takes on the challenge of supplying Grant with an audio file no longer than 5 minutes in length in which she answer’s the question ‘What Does Photography Mean to You?’
Rachel Boillot is a photographer, filmmaker, and educator based in Nashville, Tennessee. She holds a BA in Sociology from Tufts University, a BFA in Photography from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and an MFA in Experimental and Documentary Arts from Duke University. Her work has been funded by the Annenberg Foundation (Los Angeles, CA), the Riverview Foundation (Chattanooga, TN), the Tennessee Arts Commission (Nashville, TN), and the National Endowment for the Arts (Washington, D.C.). She was recently awarded the annual PhotoNola Review Award and is a 2018 Critical Mass Finalist. http://rachelboillot.com
You can also access and subscribe to these podcasts at SoundCloud https://soundcloud.com/unofphoto on iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/a-photographic-life/id1380344701 on Player FM https://player.fm/series/a-photographic-life and Podbean www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/i6uqx-6d9ad/A-Photographic-Life-Podcast
Grant Scott is the founder/curator of United Nations of Photography, a Senior Lecturer in Professional Photography at the University of Gloucestershire, a working photographer, and the author of Professional Photography: The New Global Landscape Explained (Focal Press 2014) and The Essential Student Guide to Professional Photography (Focal Press 2015). His next book New Ways of Seeing: The Democratic Language of Photography will be published by Bloomsbury Academic in 2019. He is currently work on his next documentary film project Woke Up This Morning: The Rock n' Roll Thunder of Ray Lowry www.wokeupthismorningfilm.com.
His documentary film, Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay has been screened across the UK and the US in 2018 and will be screened in the US and Canada in 2019.
© Grant Scott 2019

Mar 20, 2019 • 21min
A Photographic Life - 47: Plus Paolo Roversi
In episode 47 UNP founder and curator Grant Scott is in his shed considering working for free, the relevance of stoicism to the photographer, and the importance of retaining photographic integrity to work within advertising photography.
Plus this week Grant re-visits a recorded conversation he had with legendary fashion and portrait photographer Paolo Roversi in London in 2011.
Born in Ravenna, Italy in 1947, Paolo Roversi’s interest in photography was kindled as a teenager during a family vacation in Spain in 1964. On returning home, he set up a darkroom in a cellar with another keen amateur, the local postman Battista Minguzzi, and Paolo began developing and printing his own black & white work. In 1970 he began working with the Associated Press and on his first assignment, was sent to cover the poet and writer Ezra Pound’s funeral in Venice. During the same year he opened, with his friend Giancarlo Gramantieri his first portrait studio, located in Ravenna, photographing local celebrities and their families. In 1971 by chance he met the legendary Art Director of Elle magazine Peter Knapp and at Knapp’s invitation, Paolo visited Paris in 1973 and he has never left. In Paris he started working as a reporter but gradually, began to approach fashion photography. The British photographer Lawrence Sackmann took Paolo on as his assistant in 1974 but after just nine months he started out on his own with small commissions for magazines such as Elle and Depeche Mode before Marie Claire magazine published his first major fashion story. A Christian Dior beauty campaign brought him wider recognition in 1980, the year he started using the 8" x 10” Polaroid format that would become his trademark. During the 1980s the fashion industry started to produce catalogues which allowed photographers to express creative and personal work and designers such as Comme des Garcons, Yohji Yamamoto, and Romeo Gigli gave Paolo that opportunity. Since the the 80's his work has been subject to many exhibitions and books and he has received many awards for his work. Today Paolo is a regular contributor and collaborator with the most interesting and influential fashion designers and fashion magazines around the world. www.paoloroversi.com
You can also access and subscribe to these podcasts at SoundCloud https://soundcloud.com/unofphoto on iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/a-photographic-life/id1380344701 on Player FM https://player.fm/series/a-photographic-life and Podbean www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/i6uqx-6d9ad/A-Photographic-Life-Podcast
Grant Scott is the founder/curator of United Nations of Photography, a Senior Lecturer in Professional Photography at the University of Gloucestershire, a working photographer, and the author of Professional Photography: The New Global Landscape Explained (Focal Press 2014) and The Essential Student Guide to Professional Photography (Focal Press 2015). His next book New Ways of Seeing: The Democratic Language of Photography will be published by Bloomsbury Academic in 2019. He is currently work on his next documentary film project Woke Up This Morning: The Rock n' Roll Thunder of Ray Lowry www.wokeupthismorningfilm.com.
His documentary film, Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay has been screened across the UK and the US in 2018 and will be screened in the US and Canada in 2019.
© Grant Scott 2019

Mar 13, 2019 • 22min
A Photographic Life - 46: Plus Craig Easton
In episode 46 UNP founder and curator Grant Scott is in his shed considering photographic expectation, the need for clarity in process and the importance of learning from others more experienced than ourselves.
Plus this week photographer Craig Easton takes on the challenge of supplying Grant with an audio file no longer than 5 minutes in length in which he answer’s the question ‘What Does Photography Mean to You?’
Craig Easton is a Scottish photographer based in England known for his dramatic landscape work and intimate portraits. His early career was defined by work for the groundbreaking Independent newspaper in London and he has since gone on to win numerous awards for both his commissioned work and personal projects. Recent awards include: the FC Barcelona PhotoAward 2017, Sony World Photography Awards, 2017, the Landscape Portfolio award, World Travel Photographer of the Year 2016/17 and Cutty Sark Award for World Travel Photographer of the Year 2012/13. His advertising clients include Land Rover, John Lewis, Wagamama and Barclay's Bank. Craig also leads a group project titled Sixteen with fifteen other photographers around the UK. The project gives a voice to the next generation allowing them to speak about their dreams, ambitions, hopes and fears for the future. It explores how upbringing, social background, ethnicity, gender and location influence what you feel you can achieve in life and how you might fulfil your potential. www.craigeaston.com
You can also access and subscribe to these podcasts at SoundCloud https://soundcloud.com/unofphoto on iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/a-photographic-life/id1380344701 on Player FM https://player.fm/series/a-photographic-life and Podbean www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/i6uqx-6d9ad/A-Photographic-Life-Podcast
Grant Scott is the founder/curator of United Nations of Photography, a Senior Lecturer in Professional Photography at the University of Gloucestershire, a working photographer, and the author of Professional Photography: The New Global Landscape Explained (Focal Press 2014) and The Essential Student Guide to Professional Photography (Focal Press 2015). His next book New Ways of Seeing: The Democratic Language of Photography will be published by Bloomsbury Academic in 2019. He is currently work on his next documentary film project Woke Up This Morning: The Rock n' Roll Thunder of Ray Lowry www.wokeupthismorningfilm.com.
His documentary film, Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay has been screened across the UK and the US in 2018 and will be screened in the US and Canada in 2019.
© Grant Scott 2019

Mar 6, 2019 • 21min
A Photographic Life - 45: Plus Derek Ridgers
In episode 45 UNP founder and curator Grant Scott is in his shed considering applications for the UNP mentorship programme, online paid reviews, and how to price prints to sell.
Plus this week photographer Derek Ridgers takes on the challenge of supplying Grant with an audio file no longer than 5 minutes in length in which he answer’s the question ‘What Does Photography Mean to You?’
Derek Ridgers, is an English photographer with a career spanning over thirty years. The emergence of punk rock in the UK in the late 1970S fascinated Ridgers and amongst his first published work were pictures taken at punk gigs at the Hammersmith Palais, London. During this time he photographed Adam and the Ants, The Slits, Penetration, The Clash and The Damned, work exhibited at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London in 1978. Ridgers became a professional photographer and began working regularly for music and style magazines such as the NME and The Face as well as documenting the British fetish club scene. He also began to photograph music and film stars of the era, for national newspapers and other publications, such as Frank Zappa, John Lee Hooker, The Ramones, Prince, The Spice Girls, J. G. Ballard, Richard Harris and Martin Amis. As well as photographing a wide range of musicians, actors, writers and athletes, during his long tenure as a cover/features photographer at Loaded magazine Ridgers established his own page of club photographs called Getting Away With It, which ran for fifteen years until 2010. Many of these black and white fetish club scene photographs were later included in the book Stare: Portraits from the Endless Night. His book When We were Young: Club and Street Portraits 1978 – 1987 collects together portraits of young skinheads, punks and new romantics from the seventies through to the late eighties; many, like Boy George, Steve Strange and Spandau Ballet, photographed whilst still unknown. Ridgers has worked for Time Out, The Sunday Telegraph, NME, The Face, Loaded, The Independent on Sunday, The Guardian, The Observer, The Sunday Times, The Independent, GQ, GQ Style, Melody Maker and Sounds. www.derekridgers.com
You can also access and subscribe to these podcasts at SoundCloud https://soundcloud.com/unofphoto on iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/a-photographic-life/id1380344701 on Player FM https://player.fm/series/a-photographic-life and Podbean www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/i6uqx-6d9ad/A-Photographic-Life-Podcast
Grant Scott is the founder/curator of United Nations of Photography, a Senior Lecturer in Professional Photography at the University of Gloucestershire, a working photographer, and the author of Professional Photography: The New Global Landscape Explained (Focal Press 2014) and The Essential Student Guide to Professional Photography (Focal Press 2015). His next book New Ways of Seeing: The Democratic Language of Photography will be published by Bloomsbury Academic in 2019. He is currently work on his next documentary film project Woke Up This Morning: The Rock n' Roll Thunder of Ray Lowry www.wokeupthismorningfilm.com.
His documentary film, Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay has been screened across the UK and the US in 2018 and will be screened in the US and Canada in 2019.
© Grant Scott 2019

Feb 27, 2019 • 22min
A Photographic Life - 44: Plus David Levenson
In episode 44 UNP founder and curator Grant Scott is in his shed considering photo education within universities and transferable skills all photographers have but may not have considered as relevant to other films of visual communication.
Plus this week photographer David Levenson takes on the challenge of supplying Grant with an audio file no longer than 5 minutes in length in which he answer’s the question ‘What Does Photography Mean to You?’
You can read more about Grant's views on photographic education here https://unitednationsofphotography.com/2016/04/20/im-a-photographer-let-me-in-opening-the-door-to-photo-education/
You can read the article Grant mentions in this week's podcast concerning the future of photography here https://unitednationsofphotography.com/2019/02/03/where-next-for-photography-and-the-photographer/
Based in London, David has been a photographer since he left school, learning his craft at a Fleet Street press agency. He covered news stories around London, including the Iranian Embassy siege, the Brixton riots and the early days of Lady Diana. Throughout the 1980's he photographed Princess Diana and the Royal Family, visiting over fifty countries and producing sixteen illustrated books on their travels. His work is published every week by leading magazines, newspapers and websites around the world including Time, Newsweek, Vanity Fair, Paris Match, The Guardian, The Times, Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail, Daily Express, LA Times, New York Times, New Yorker, The Spectator, New Statesman, La Vanguardia, Irish Times, Huffington Post, Sunday Times and the Observer. David's work is held in MOMA, New York, the Tate Gallery, London and the National Art Library at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. http://davidlevenson.com
You can also access and subscribe to these podcasts at SoundCloud https://soundcloud.com/unofphoto on iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/a-photographic-life/id1380344701 on Player FM https://player.fm/series/a-photographic-life and Podbean www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/i6uqx-6d9ad/A-Photographic-Life-Podcast
Grant Scott is the founder/curator of United Nations of Photography, a Senior Lecturer in Professional Photography at the University of Gloucestershire, a working photographer, and the author of Professional Photography: The New Global Landscape Explained (Focal Press 2014) and The Essential Student Guide to Professional Photography (Focal Press 2015). His next book New Ways of Seeing: The Democratic Language of Photography will be published by Bloomsbury Academic in 2019. He is currently work on his next documentary film project Woke Up This Morning: The Rock n' Roll Thunder of Ray Lowry www.wokeupthismorningfilm.com.
His documentary film, Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay has been screened across the UK and the US in 2018 and will be screened in the US and Canada in 2019.
© Grant Scott 2019

Feb 20, 2019 • 21min
A Photographic Life - 43: Plus Marc Wilson
In episode 43 UNP founder and curator Grant Scott is in his shed considering the excitement of discovering lost archives and lost images, recommends two recent documentaries and reflects upon how the past fifty years of American photography could have been so different.
Plus this week photographer Marc Wilson takes on the challenge of supplying Grant with an audio file no longer than 5 minutes in length in which he answer’s the question ‘What Does Photography Mean to You?’
Born in London, 1968, Marc Wilson lives in Bath, England and his photography documents the memories and histories that are set in the landscapes that surround us. His current work in progress, A Wounded Landscape, begun in 2015, documents the geography of the Holocaust, based around a small number of stories, with locations in over 20 different countries throughout Europe and the former Soviet Republics. His previous work, The Last Stand, was researched and photographed over a four year period, and looks at some of the remaining Second World War military coastal defences around the coastlines of Northern Europe, from Norway to the Franco-Spanish border and The Northern Isles of the UK. The work was an award winner at The Terry O’Neill Awards in 2013 and was published as a book in late 2014. Marc's work has been exhibited at The Royal Armouries Museum, Focalpoint Gallery and The Anise Gallery, London and included in group shows at The Photographers Gallery and the Association of Photographers Gallery, London, the Athens PhotoFestival, 2015 and the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, 2018. His work has been published in journals and magazines ranging from The British Journal of Photography and Raw to Wired and Dezeen. www.marcwilson.co.uk.
You can also access and subscribe to these podcasts at SoundCloud https://soundcloud.com/unofphoto on iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/a-photographic-life/id1380344701 on Player FM https://player.fm/series/a-photographic-life Podbean www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/i6uqx-6d9ad/A-Photographic-Life-Podcast and Spotify spotify:show:4oOnPplYSeCKIYqopCK3ra
Grant Scott is the founder/curator of United Nations of Photography, a Senior Lecturer in Professional Photography at the University of Gloucestershire, a working photographer, and the author of Professional Photography: The New Global Landscape Explained (Focal Press 2014) and The Essential Student Guide to Professional Photography (Focal Press 2015). His next book New Ways of Seeing: The Democratic Language of Photography will be published by Bloomsbury Academic in 2019. He is currently work on his next documentary film project Woke Up This Morning: The Rock n' Roll Thunder of Ray Lowry www.wokeupthismorningfilm.com.
His documentary film, Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay has been screened across the UK and the US in 2018 and will be screened in the US and Canada in 2019.
© Grant Scott 2019

Feb 13, 2019 • 20min
A Photographic Life - 42: Plus Brian Griffin
In episode 42 UNP founder and curator Grant Scott is in his shed considering the sacrifices photographers make to create work and the commitment required from friends and family to support those dedicated to the medium.
You can read the full article featuring Don McCullin and Giles Duley mentioned in this week's podcast here www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2019/feb/03/don-mccullin-giles-duley-photography-retrospective-tate-interview
Plus this week photographer Brian Griffin takes on the challenge of supplying Grant with an audio file no longer than 5 minutes in length in which he answer’s the question ‘What Does Photography Mean to You?’
Brian Griffin was born in 1948 and lives and works in London. Considered “the photographer of the decade” by The Guardian in 1989, “the most unpredictable and influential British portrait photographer of the last decades” by the British Journal of Photography in 2005 and “one of Britain’s most influential photographers” by the World Photography Organisation in 2015, Brian has worked as a freelance photographer, filmmaker and TV commercials and music video film director since 1972.
Brian Griffin has published over thirty books and was awarded the Best Photography book in the World at the Barcelona Primavera Fotografica 1991. Life magazine used his photograph A Broken Frame on the front cover of its supplement The Greatest Photographs Of The 80’s. In 1991, after twenty years, he “walked away from photography” and began a career creating advertising commercials and music videos. He returned to photography in 2002 and has had more than fifteen solo shows and four retrospectives since. Brian has won many awards including four ‘Most Outstanding Awards’ from the D&AD (Design and Art Direction), and the ‘Freedom of the City of Arles, France’. He won the ‘Best Commercial of the Year’ at the Bafta Academy awards in 1992 and his short movie Claustrofoamia received the ‘Golden Monkey Award’ for Best Film at the Mons International Short Film Festival in Belgium and the ‘Certificate of Merit’ at the Chicago International Film Festival, both in 1995.
In September 2013, Brian received the ‘Centenary Medal’ from the Royal Photographic Society in recognition of a lifetime achievement in photography. In 2014, he received an Honorary Doctorate by Birmingham City University for his lifetime contribution to the City of Birmingham. Brian Griffin’s photographs are held in the permanent collections of major art institutions including the Victoria & Albert Museum, London; the Arts Council of Great Britain, London; the British Council, London; the National Portrait Gallery, London; the Museum Folkwang, Essen; the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery; the Art Museum Reykjavik, Iceland; the Mast Foundation, Bologna; and the Museu da Imagem, Braga, Portugal. www.briangriffin.co.uk
You can also access and subscribe to these podcasts at SoundCloud https://soundcloud.com/unofphoto on iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/a-photographic-life/id1380344701 on Player FM https://player.fm/series/a-photographic-life and Podbean www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/i6uqx-6d9ad/A-Photographic-Life-Podcast
Grant Scott is the founder/curator of United Nations of Photography, a Senior Lecturer in Professional Photography at the University of Gloucestershire, a working photographer, and the author of Professional Photography: The New Global Landscape Explained (Focal Press 2014) and The Essential Student Guide to Professional Photography (Focal Press 2015). His next book New Ways of Seeing: The Democratic Language of Photography will be published by Bloomsbury Academic in 2019. He is currently work on his next documentary film project Woke Up This Morning: The Rock n' Roll Thunder of Ray Lowry.
His documentary film, Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay has been screened across the UK and the US in 2018 and will be screened in the US and Canada in 2019.
© Grant Scott 2019