It’s May, so that can only mean one thing: endless bank holidays, beer gardens and London’s Photo London exhibition, an annual photography fair which is hosted yearly within the grounds of Somerset House. I go every year, for better or for worse, so here are my tips and tricks.
The Tent
The Tent is just a tent, a large white structure in the middle of the grounds. You really can’t miss it, even if you wanted to. In fact, most people I bump into during the event actively avoid it. I would describe The Tent as a place where the Flickr famous photographers of yesteryear make their money. Everyone in The Tent is painfully posh, everyone is carrying a champagne flute, and everyone seems to feel the need to drop tens of thousands of pounds on the most obscene versions of A-Level art I have ever seen. There’s endless nudity, abstract collages of flowers, countless animal photographs.
Publishers
The publishers section, a space filled with a variety of independent publishers, is directly to the left of The Tent. It’s also next to a Watchhouse Coffee Shop. This is a great section and the one that most of the people reading this can probably afford to peruse. There’s photobooks galore, and a few reasonably priced prints.
Gost has a huge array of books including POP by the late Brian Griffin, a true pioneer in 20th century photography and someone I had the honour of assisting many years ago; I still think about how I loaded a roll of film backwards. Port Talbot UFO Investigation Club by Roo Lewis, an incredible photo book about the area’s unusually high number of UFO sightings, and beautiful prints by Don McCullen and Sam Wright.
Imageless also caught my eye, a publisher based out of Shanghai. I was really drawn to Tokyo Candy Box by Koji Onaka, this body of work sees Onaka’s first exploration into shooting colour film. Then there’s New Dimension, a brilliant independent publisher run by Ben Goulder. They were showcasing Kieran Perry’s Smoke Filled Mirrors, a photo book exploring circus life through Perry’s lens. They also had a giant whale head displayed on the table which was awesome. Oh, and you can also buy a Martin Parr print for 99£ in this section if you’re so inclined. I wasn’t.
The Top Floor
After the publishers I would head to the top floor of the main building. There’s a lot of stairs in Somerset house, so best to get it out of the way and work your way down. The Music Photo Gallery had loads of sexy photos of Bob Dylan and Mick Jagger, which is pretty cool. Then there’s the enormous Belmond room, which saw Colin Dodgson’s sun drenched images splayed across the walls. His work is fucking awesome. He once sent me a postcard of a sock during Covid. I also really want to go on a Belmond train so badly. The final section worth checking out is Bettina Pittaluga. Her work is just super beautiful and super intimate.
The Ground Floor
After making your way down a grand spiral staircase, there’s an Autofoto film photobooth which I’m a sucker for. I overhear someone complaining about the price of this “Seven pounds, outrageous!” Lady, do you not know how expensive film is? You have to wait four minutes for it to develop though, which feels like an extremely long time. The David Hill Gallery has a wonderful selection of images. Photographers include Kyle Weeks, Alice Mann and Larry Fink. I thought this section had the most thoughtful selection of photographs and is definitely worth hunting out. Dellasposa exclusively showing David Bailey. Damn, I forgot how good he is. With great talent however, comes exuberant price tags. £18,000 minimum for a print. Fair enough. Then there’s Iconic Image Gallery. There’s a bunch of, well, iconic images. I keep getting lost and stumble upon a live photo shoot sponsored by Nikon. It’s kind of awkward so I evacuate and continue on my quest for nice photos. Harder than you think but you just have to be patient.
The Basement
Into the abyss, but it’s totally worth it. I immediately bump into someone I know — Hannah Norton — and she shows me some work she has on display, great stuff. Jesse Glazzard has a whole section on a series they photographed in Ukraine. At Serchia Gallery the four black and white photos on display are quite magical. New Discretions is another interesting section. Some of the works, if I remember correctly, are made from blood and resin. I have no idea how you even go about making something like that but it looks incredible. Palm Studios have a great selection of photos including Molly Matalon, Caroline Tompkins and Lola + Pani, who are also the founders. My good friend Robin Lambert made the furniture for their display which is a lovely touch. I’m not gonna talk about Gosha.
The Lower Basement
Why is all the best stuff hidden away in the basement? This is by far the best part of the entire exhibit. I’m just going to list my favourites on show down here: Simon Roberts, Rut Blees Luxemberg, Jamie Hawkesworth, Edmund Clark, Hannah Starkey, Mitra Tabrizian, Tom Hunter, Nigel Shafran and Mary McCartney. Most of the prints are huge (as God intended). After scrambling back up a labyrinth of stairs I’m greeted with Adam Rouhana’s work and my faith in photography is cemented. His work on Palestine is, personally, some of the most important photographs being made at the moment. As I’m leaving I spot someone with an Olympus XA-2, a camera I recently dug out of a box that has reignited the spark of photography for me. We are so back.
Takeaways
Don’t take a huge bag or you’ll have to use the cloakroom which is literally in a different county.
The basement is the best section. The lower basement even better.
You have to do The Tent as a social experiment.
Pay £7 for the photobooth, it’s cute.
