Who What Where photography exhibition comes to Brixton

WHO WHAT WHERE is a photography exhibition showing at the Brixton Pound (27 Jan – 2 Feb). The images celebrate the diversity of cultures across the world through the encounters the photographers have made during their travels.

Saskia Selwood, Frankie Mills and Charlotte Harding, all anthropology students, capture the beauty of portraits, using digital and film photography. The photographs follow their individual travels through Africa, Mexico and India.

Through these portraits the viewer is invited to observe an honest scene through the eyes of the photographer, all three women emphasised the importance of creating a relationship of respect between the subject and themselves which is, ‘especially important when there is also the perceived barrier of language’. Shot on 35mm film, the portraits and landscapes confront the viewer with the photographer’s situation as an outsider in a foreign setting.

The photographers say: “A central theme to the photographs is a sense of human connectedness; in which one can identify with a culture foreign to one’s own and share something with a person regardless of perceived barriers such as language.

The photographs frame the subjects in their own spaces – whether market towns, a football stadium or rural landscapes. This only adds to the collections feeling of familiarity and nostalgia. Harding commented “the culture makes the people and the people make the photo, it was so important that we showed this through our collection”. Mills added: “The result is a series of framed moments which capture the beauty and the ‘poetry behind seeing someone in their own space, where they feel familiar’.

Who What Where isn’t the end of their travels, Mills hopes to continue her passion for photography in her local area and volunteering inspired by working in a refugee centre in Mexico City, Selwood plans to move to Portugal to engage more with community projects and Harding is continuing to write for the British Journal of photography, and collaborating on a project called ‘Girls In Film‘.

The opening event will be held on the 27 January at Brixton Pound, 77 Atlantic road SW9 8PU from 7pm.

Photographs will also be being sold at the event.