The majority of my work is concerned with humanitarian and social issues, particularly human displacement due to environmental change. I spent the last four years working for the BBC in London and following personal photographic projects throughout Europe and the Middle East. In 2012 I exhibited at the National Portrait Gallery as part of The National Photographic Portrait Prize and Foto8 London as part of the Summer Show. During the same year I was named a winner of The Magenta Foundation Flash Forward Emerging Photographer Award for the UK. In 2012 I published with the Sunday Times Spectrum Magazine, 6Mois France and Witness Journal Italy. More recently I was named as a finalist for the Environmental Photographer of the Year Award and am currently exhibiting my Iran series The Disappearance of Lake Urmia, at the National Geographic Society in London.
Urban Paris, France For this portfolio I would like to present three series. The first looks at the urban spaces of Paris and how humans interact in this space. The series was photographed over two days in Paris as a part of the workshop with Ed Kashi.
The Disappearance of Lake Umria, Iran The second is a series of work on Lake Urmia in Iran, which is the largest salt lake in the Middle East. The vast lake lies far away from the country’s capital Tehran, between the provinces of East and West Azerbaijan. Due to irrigation and damming projects which block the water flow to the lake, Lake Urmia is emptying fast and very little water remains in what used to be a massive body of water. The lake has now shrunk by a massive 60% and experts warn that it could disappear entirely. If Lake Urmia does dry completely the effects on both the local community and also the larger community will be immense. The deterioration of Lake Urmia impacts 13 million local inhabitants, as well as the nations of Turkey, Azerbaijan, Iraq, and Armenia. After the Apology;
Women from the Stolen Generation The third series is a new series which is currently a work in process. The forcible removal of Aboriginal children from their families throughout the 1900s is arguably one of the worst atrocities of the 20th century in Australia. In 1995 an inquiry was conducted into the forcible removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their homes. These abducted children are now known as The Stolen Generation. The report took two years to complete and in 1997 the results of this inquiry were presented to the Australian Federal Parliament in a report called ‘Bringing Them Home’. The Bringing Them Home Report included several recommendations, among them a recommendation that the Australian Parliaments offer an official apology to the Indigenous and Torres Strait Islander populations of Australia. It took more than one decade from the first presentation of this report for the Federal Government of Australia to make an official Apology to the people of The Stolen Generation. The formal apology by the Australian Federal Government to Indigenous Australians has been widely recognised as the first step towards reconciliation and healing for the aboriginal peoples of Australia. This, however, was only the beginning. Five years on; what has changed for women, in particular, from the Stolen Generation? This photographic series tells the story of women from Indigenous and Torres Strait Islander backgrounds who were directly or indirectly affected by what happened to The Stolen Generation. Through portraiture and landscapes taken from the subjects’ own special place or ‘country’ combined with quotes taken from interviews the final images in this series are an in-depth exploration into the themes of grief, loss and reconciliation following the Australian Federal Government’s formal apology of 2008.
