New long-form essays on contemporary photography by Offline Journal & guest writers.
Essay #7
’Bargoed’ to Bargoed
Written by Ian Walker
‘Bargoed’ to Bargoed centres on the story of a painting made by the artist L.S. Lowry on a visit to the South Wales mining area of Bargoed. The same view was photographed twenty years later by John Davies as part of the Valleys Project and it is fascinating to compare the two images.
This is framed within photography writer Ian Walker’s
own history with the area, past and present.
A4 / 16 pages / colour
£5.00
Essay #6
Home: In another land
Written by Glenn Edwards
Newport-based photojournalist Glenn Edwards has had a long association with and love of Africa and the populations of the continent’s many nations from the start of his career.
‘Home: In another land’ recounts the story of bringing one recent and ongoing photography project in which he documents the African community in and around Wales - from concept through to the first of what would eventually be several exhibitions, and the experience of negotiating the politics of contemporary curators and galleries showing black lives photographed by white photographers.
A4 / 4 pages / colour
Essay #5
Hirael
Written by Gary Stuart
HIRAEL tells the story of the late Gary Stuart’s entry into photography whilst living and working in Bangor, North Wales in the early 1970s prior to his move to England and a long and successful career as a professional photographer.
Published by Café Royal Books in late 2021 as ‘Hirael, North Wales – 1976’, Stuart’s sensitive images document a proud but small and disappearing community on the edge of Bangor and a unique record of a time and place?
A4 / 8 pages / mono
£4.00
Essay #4
ffotoview - an overview
Written by Robert Greetham
Written for Offline Journal by Robert Greetham - an early Director of Ffotogallery in the 1980's. This fascinating essay tells the story of Wales' first printed Journal on photography by its Editor.
Published over twelve issues between 1982-1985, ffotoview originated from a simple 4-page Newsletter and developed into a quarterly magazine offering updates on not just Ffotogallery's activities but the wider photography scene and culture at a time when photography galleries were emerging across the UK.
A4 / 4 pages / mono
Essay #3
Sites of struggle and photography
Written by Paul Cabuts
In 'Sites of struggle and photography', Paul Cabuts discusses
the use of photographs to highlight hardship and distress;
and also explore their ongoing relationship to the story
of photography and Wales.
This new essay includes discussions on Jim Mortram’s 'Small Town Inertia' and Dan Wood’s 'Pove the Great'. It considers earlier work by others, and addresses questions around photography that include: a) can photographs pictorially depict distress or is additional evidence essential?; b) who are such photographic works for?; and c) how can photographs of distress change anything?
A4 / 4 pages / mono
Essay #2
Gap in the Hedge (after Dan Wood)
Written by Siôn Tomos Owen
A unique poem written by Valleys artist Siôn Tomos Owen over four pages that narrates Dan Wood’s '‘Gap in the Hedge’ images as shown on his website.
Specially written to accompany a limited edition exhibition poster produced for Dan Wood’s ‘Gap in the Hedge’ exhibition shown at the 2019 Northern EYE Photography Festival in Colwyn Bay, North Wales.
A4 / 4 pages / mono
Essay #1
The Daniel Meadows Archive in nine people
Written by Daniel Meadows
With his important photography archive now held in the prestigious Bodleian Library in Oxford and his ‘Now and Then’ retrospective exhibition and book of the same name launched in October 2019, acclaimed documentarian Daniel Meadows has written the first Offline Essay on the theme of the photographic archive - using himself as a unique case study.
It’s an insightful and, in places, moving piece that all photographers who consider their work of some value – culturally and/or monetary – in the long-term should read more than once!
A4 / 4 pages / mono