Sustaining Your Practice
Food & Art 4
LAURA LETINSKY Hardly More Than Ever: photographs 1999 – 2004 “Letinsky’s generation is heir to modernism’s triumph at making photography a fine art. Despite the cloak of casual disregard show to neglected foodstuffs and dirty dishes, Letinsky’s images are calculated constructions with nary an anxiety about their roots in seventeenth Dutch still life painting”. (Ghez.…
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ESTHER CHOI, LE CORBUFFET Le Corbuffet is a most creative and entertaining cookery book. Esther Choi is a Korean / Canadian with a ph.D in architectural history and theory from Princeton University, a Masters in design from Harvard, an MFA from Concordia and a BFA in photography from Ryerson University. Choi has held teaching appointments…
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ONE THIRD, Klaus Pichler https://klauspichler.net/project/one-third/ I discovered Klaus Pichler’s body of work, One Third, a few years ago. The work was created round 2012 and has been exhibited worldwide. Unfortunately little has changed in relation to food wastage in the intervening years. Indeed the World Food Program in 2020 maintained that one third of our…
Keep readingPortfolio Review, Tina Wing
Tina was the second commercial photographer who kindly agreed to provide feedback on a portfolio of photographs. We finally got to meet up over a Zoom call on the 24th April. Tina is a busy photographer photographing not just food, but weddings and events as well. We went through all 30 images one by one…
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BEATLE IN THE BOX I’m not sure if the title of this series is a reference to Wittgenstein’s Beetle In A Box theory. If so it is tenuous and I cannot make a connection between Wittgensein’s views on language and the work here. But as a political / food / art statement it is close…
Keep readingThe Centre for British Photography
I was in London for a few days last week and visited this new centre for British photography which opened in January. I have studied many of the photographers over the last few years and it was very enjoyable to see their work on the wall rather than in a book or on a web…
Keep readingBook Design Decisions
This document builds on cyanotype decisions and is designed to explain and analyse my decisions in a way I hope my final assessors may find helpful. There would appear to be an expectation, rightly or wrongly, that SYP will see a continuation of Body of Work culminating in an exhibition, book or anything that makes…
Keep readingComplete Set Of Book Images
These images are also being curated on a new Instagram page Rob Stewart (@rob.syp) | Instagram where three images are being published daily in reverse order. I am linking and hash-tagging anyone I think may find this project of interest. The cyanotypes are designed with a wider boarder, I want them to look ‘framed’. The…
Keep readingCyanotype Decisions
The decision to use cyanotype in the book was grounded in the desire to produce a body of work that had artistic merit and wasn’t simply another cookery book. Years ago cookery books were illustrated (if at all) with simple line drawings and this illustrative effect was the aim. ‘Straight’ photographs of ingredients can be…
Keep readingPortfolio Review, Danielle Wood
I was truly delighted to receive the following portfolio review from Danielle Wood. Clearly she had invested time and effort to provide a constructive, informative and generally very helpful review in response to Assignment one, Sustaining Your Practice. Thank you Danielle. Robin Stewart – Portfolio reviewThank you for emailing over your portfolio for me to…
Keep readingLayout & Sequencing
Printing the text and images for ‘Season To Taste’ created the mildly surreal feeling that this project was going to be fully realised. It is a big step moving work from hard drive and screen to tactile printed paper. Even just on cheap copy paper the imagery looked how I wanted it to and actually…
Keep readingPhyllida Barlow
I’m starting to enjoy the feeling of freedom from structured studying to explore other avenues of creativity. A framework for study is necessary for assessments, but even my choice and decisions for body of work and dissertation at times felt like a noose around my neck and left no time (allowing for work too) to…
Keep readingSource Magazine
I have mentioned before that I produced a short body of work with Paul Hill and Maria Falkener last year “Been There, Done That”. This work was concerned with tourism and souvenirs. I printed 20 copies using Mixam and was curious to see if I could actually sell any. I set up an online shop…
Keep readingPink Lady Food Photographer of the Year
I submitted several photographs to PLFPOTY this year and two were shortlisted. One of the images was a rooibos toned cyanotype that I made for my SYP project and it was particularly rewarding to receive a little validation for this work in the category for innovation. Neither image has progressed further, but will be recorded…
Keep readingPicture Framing Workshop
I find it exciting to get a photograph professionally printed, will it look as good in the flesh as it did on my screen? The next step to printing is framing, something I wanted to learn for myself. Pen Hill Framing offer half day workshops, although in the end I was there nearly six hours.…
Keep readingPortfolio Review 2
I downloaded a free portfolio guide a few days ago. Written by Kimberly Espinel from thelittleplantation.co.uk This is Kimberly’s introduction: “A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to have a faceto face meeting with folks from one of London’s TOPphotography agencies. It’s here where the mostrecognisable and cherished brands go to findphotographers to shoot…
Keep readingPortfolio Review
As a start to finding someone who would be prepared to review my food photography portfolio, I thought I would start with the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year. I have entered this competition over many years with some success, so it seemed a good place to start. No reply yet, but it’s early…
Keep readingSYP Feedback / Review
I recently submitted a series of portrait images to Lensculture, results announced March / April. I asked for a review to help my development. Reading the review, which was most helpful, I can see that I could have conceptualized my series far more effectively. This is something I’m not very good at and need to…
Keep readingSustaining Your Practice
The purpose of this website is to consolidate my OCA degree work from the last eight years. My practice has always been quite varied which would appear a little unusual compared to my peers. The first part of SYP is about broadening my network – not an easy thing to do today when so many…
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