Photo North Festival

Photo North Festival was held in Leeds, exhibiting different photographers and holding a number of talks. I attended this event with Ross Mead https://rossmeadphoto.co.uk/ . It was nice to interact with different associations and photographers. Festivals like Photo North are always a good place to network. One particular interaction that stuck with me was one with Chris Floyd, we were able to have a nice conversation with him about his work with celebrities and about his photobook. He was very nice and even agreed to donate a print to our fundraising print sale for our university exhibition. Though we asked him a few questions the most helpful for me was asking him how he started out as a photographer and as I’ve heard from many different practioners in the industry he also begun by assisting. This made my motivation even greater to become an assistant to start my path into the career.

Another pleasant thing about Photo North festival was simply how friendly everyone was, I asked about volunteering there in the future and it doesn’t seem too diffucult to participate and get invovled with. One of the university guest speakers, Joanne Coates, had her work exhibited. I much prefer being able to see a collection in print than solely on the screen as it allows for a deeper understanding of the work.

Although there was a small entry fee I would certainly visit Photo North Festival again as it’s nicce to be around groups of people that all share a passion for the same thing and all willing to help each other progress in the field. It even introduced me to online groups where their are ongoing projects supporting different photographic themes, some then being exhibited at different events.