As a Sheffield born and bred photographer to find out I had been published in an exhibition about my home town was amazing. I deliberated for hours on what to wear only later to find out that I really shouldnt have bothered.
I was picturing screen style room dividers set in the beautiful winter gardens, with our prints lovingly framed and hung, something that would make those office workers stand up from thir picnic lunch and take a look, and make them think "look at how beautiful our city is"
Unfortunatly thats not what I saw I walked in, and I wondered if id even got the right place, there was no advertising or promotion around the building itself,
the opening night which Id had a special invitation to was held on st patricks day which in itself was a mistake in my opinion, due to the fact random drunken members of the public could walk through I also worried about what would happen to our images.
when I walked in I still saw no sinage to indicate that I was in the right place, I was feeling a little over dressed and under whelmed, where was the fancy free food and drink?
as I got to the center of the gardens 3 wooden easel type stands came into view, I still couldnt see the name of the exhibition but as I got closer I reckognised the images that had been picked from 1st year foundation degree students, instantly I was proud (Id not spotted mine at this point) but had I been a member of the general public I still wouldnt have understood what was going on.
the work itself was such a varied collection of iconic sheffield images mixed with a few of the lesser know gems or ideas of sheffield, I liked all the facets that sheffield has and that each of the photographers really had different views on the city. I liked that not all there views were not all pretty because lets face it sheffield is great for a lot of things but not so great for others
the report that was published only contained a few of the images the report itself can be downloaded here
https://www.sheffieldfirst.com/key-documents/state-of-sheffield.html
Jamie shipston was the winner of the night being awarded both 3rd and 1st place with really strong images
overall I loved the variety of work on show but I felt the planning and displaying of the work lacked thought and any creativity there didnt seem to be a reason to how the images were displayed ie maybe a steel framework rather than timber to represent the steel city,
