Amy Woodman. Styled and photographed by me in Dec 2016.
If 2020 has taught us anything its that discos can happen anywhere but are extra good in the kitchen. Have a great weekend, enjoy some music, dance even if its just to one track. Three minutes of movement to music is better than nothing at all.
If you’d like to discuss commissions, projects or general enquires feel free to email me hello@kerrycurl.com and you can see new work and work from my archives over on my instagram
New work for my ongoing project ‘This is Not Nostalgia?’
In 2015 after years of wearing secondhand & vintage clothes I began creating ‘fashion’ imagery using preloved items to question why everything in fashion magazines was always ‘new’. Why the constant ‘buy buy buy’ message? What begun as an anti ‘fashion’ creative protest, a way to disrupt the status quo, grew in to a long-form project.
At first the concept of these shoots was to demonstrate that having a vintage influence does not mean that the images are not contemporary; curating influences from the past does not mean that the images themselves are “retro”. These style influences are all around us in the here and now, they are current.
As the project has developed, it’s led to opportunities for me to talk about sustainability & image-making. Continuing to questioning (push back) on what a ‘fashion image’ is. This approach now chimes with the increasing interest in the mainstream for sustainability in the fashion industry. There’s growing desire for sustainable fashion as consumers begin to ask where their clothes come from. Almost paradoxically, the consumer demand for sustainability imposes a commercial imperative on this most egalitarian of impulses. These are interesting times to be contributing to fashion media.
Laura, photographed in performance for artist Amy Ollett in 2017.
If you’d like to discuss commissions, projects or general enquires feel free to email me hello@kerrycurl.com and you can see new work and work from my archives over on my instagram
Image of the week is Helena from Crumb Agency.
This is from a go see to create Helena some new images for her portfolio a couple of years ago. How time flies.
If you’d like to discuss commissions, projects or general enquires feel free to email me hello@kerrycurl.com and you can see new work and work from my archives over on My instagram
Andrew for Morwenna Farrell.
Morwenna has a new collection launch coming up so needed some new imagery to promote it. I’ve worked with Morwenna several times now and after chatting to Morwenna about what her ideal plan B would be (Because a torrential rain forecast made it clear plan A would need to be reviewed…) I created some set design and plan B ended up working like a dream.
I’ll share more from this shoot in another post but if you are in Norwich 23-25 Oct Morwenna has a pop up. You can also follow her over on instagram and Etsy.
I recently interviewed Morwenna for the Sans Pareil website so head over and read about her work and her sustainable approach to fashion and art. In the interview you can also see some of my photography from previous shoots.
My instagram
If you’d like to discuss commissions, projects or general enquires feel free to email me hello@kerrycurl.com
Image of the week is Poppy from Crumb Agency.
This is from a go see to get Poppy some new images for her portfolio back in 2018.
My instagram
If you’d like to discuss commissions, projects or general enquires feel free to email me hello@kerrycurl.com
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So happy to have this portrait of Matt Hales selected for AND 2020, an annual created by Then There Was Us. No physical exhibition sadly because it is 2020 and plans have to adapt but I’m so looking forward to seeing Matt in print. We took this photo in London 2018. Covid has us both back in Norfolk for a while, swapping the London parks for Norwich woodland and we actually just made some new work a couple of weeks ago. I’ve photographed Matt once a year since 2017, it wasn’t planned it’s just funny that’s the way it’s worked out. I should probably take a look back though them all and create a series.
About the AND 2020 project: Words from Then There Was Us
‘AND 2020 is an annual selection of some of the best up and coming influential documentary and portrait photographers showcasing poignant and inspiring imagery from across the globe. Each year at Then There Was Us we strive to celebrate the outstanding work of those who are consistently creating unique and powerful stories, published in a beautifully printed annual. We’d like to say a huge thanks to everyone who took the time to submit their work this year.
PRE-ORDER COMING SOON.’
I’ll share more updates as I have them. I’m beyond stoked to have my work in this annual along with so many exciting creatives. Head over to the Then There Was Us instagram for a full list of names and to follow their project.
To discuss commissions or general enquires feel free to email me
hello@kerrycurl.com and why not say hi on my instagram …
As it’s National poetry Day I thought I’d accompany this weeks image with a poem. Image Becci Ball wearing a piece from her own collection Becci
Mad Girl’s Love Song
by Sylvia Plath
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead;
I lift my lids and all is born again.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)
The stars go waltzing out in blue and red;
And arbitrary blackness gallops in:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.
I dreamed that you bewitched me in to bed
And sung me moon-struck, kissed me quite insane.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)
God topples from the sky, hells fires fade:
Exit seraphim and Satan’s men:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.
I fancied you’d return the way you said,
But I grow old and forget your name.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)
I should have loved a thunderbird instead;
At least when spring comes they roar back again.
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.
(I think I made up up inside my head.)
To discuss commissions or general enquires feel free to email me - hello@kerrycurl.com
Say hi on instagram
XU XHI - London Fashion Week AW19.
Photographed for The Glass Pineapple.
I’ll be moving over lots of blog posts from my old blog to have them all on this site in one place but in the mean time, if you’d like to see more backstage fashion documentary work then you can see a selection of images here and you can also see older blog entries using the links below -
LOOKING BACK AT LFW AW18 - PAM HOGG
LOOKING BACK TO LFW AW18 - MALAN BRETON
DOCUMENTING GRADUATE FASHION WEEK 2019 - EAST LONDON UNI
DOCUMENTING GRADUATE FASHION WEEK 2019 - NORTHUMBRIA UNI
DOCUMENTING LFW AW19 - TOLU COKER
To discuss commissions or general enquires feel free to email me - hello@kerrycurl.com
Say hi on instagram
Emma 2016.
This feels very 2020 somehow….
I hope everyone is staying well and safe in these very strange times. I am back shooting again but it certainly feels different. I’m currently sharing my secondhand fashion work over on instagram as part of Oxfam’s Secondhand September campaign. Swing by if you fancy a look - visit my instagram
Emma’s instagram
A few portraits from my first studio shoot since lockdown measures eased.
Kiri mentioned they were going through a goth phase in their personal style so we worked this in to the work we made.
There’s more images to come from this session including some video portraits which you can see some WIP of over in my instagram (links below)
https://www.instagram.com/p/CEDDj7FD2X0/
https://www.instagram.com/p/CEHD7mwji5W/
https://www.instagram.com/p/CEKTK1tDbID/
https://www.instagram.com/p/CEKoD_Aj93H/
Kiri is a music artist and we’ll be collaborating on creating some moving image from this session accompanied by some of Kiri’s music. So check back for further developments.
Something different from portraits and fashion. Lockdown was a good opportunity to go back and organise old files. So here’s a landscape from 2013 taken during my City & Guilds Level 3 Photography course. I used to enjoy these days out. We explored coastal areas, the countryside, the city of Norwich and many of Norfolk’s villages and towns. It was good to look back on these whilst locked down in Norfolk. Sometimes we need be reminded of the beautiful things that already surround us.
The first socially distanced shoot. It’s been really challenging and it looks like going forward things are going to change at least for a while. Photographers are very limited about what work we can take on and what we can do is quite often having to be stripped back, teams kept to a minimum. Extra time for cleaning. I’m following the guidance by the Association of Photographers (AOP) with regards to working. They have been hugely helpful as a resource for these times and I’ll be continuing to follow their advice on working safely and when considering which projects can go ahead and which can’t. Right now commercial projects are ‘work’ so can go ahead with covid measures in place. Again I’d advise any photographers to take a look at the AOP website for the latest advice.
Pieces from Morwenna Farrell’s latest collection shot with Dion.
Visit Morwenna’s Etsy shop
Dionne’s instagram
To discuss commissions or general enquires feel free to email me - hello@kerrycurl.com
Say hi on instagram
Earlier in the summer I wrote a blog post for PhotoGrad in response to a call out for photographers to share how they were responding to lockdown.
I’ll add some screen shots of the piece to this journal entry but please do head over to the article on the photograd website where you can read the piece along with seeing some of my images which accompany the writing and also you’ll be able to read the thoughts of other photographers too. I’ll link to the article at the end of this journal entry.
Read the article over on the Photograd website
To discuss commissions or general enquires feel free to email me - hello@kerrycurl.com
Say hi on instagram
Documenting London Fashion Week
Malan Breton SS18 Fashion Scout. Photographed for The Glass Pineapple.
The existence of Covid-19 and the changes to our lives does make me wonder if I’ll get to make this kind of work again?…
Image of the week is a portrait of artist Simon Pritchard taken in 2015. We’ve been trying to do another session for a while but juggling availability and then throwing a pandemic in to the mix means it’s something that is still on hold. Hopefully we will be able to make it happen in 2020 but we will see…
I think online exhibitions are here to stay. Physical spaces are slowly opening up but I like the way digital exhibitions can be viewed from anywhere and by anyone. So I’m delighted to find out I have an image in an online group show organised by ShutterHub.
The selected image is from my work with artist Amy Ollett. It’s a big show, over 200 photographers from around the world so lots to browse over from the comfort of your home, or maybe a distraction from the way a bus journey feels right now, a scroll in the hairdressers whilst we’re taking our own reading material…
Digital exhibitions, you get to choose when you visit, what the opening hours are and of course they are truly inclusive - everyone is invited. See the exhibition.
If you’d like to take a look at a portfolio of work I have on the Shutterhub platform you can see this here
See more of my work over on instagram if you’d like to chat about commissioning my to make work, feel free to get in touch. I have also recently launched a print shop if you’d like a browse click here
‘It’s only a game show’ Amy 2016
This is one of many times I’ve worked with Amy Woodman. I met Amy on a photoshoot in 2014 where I was doing hair/makeup and some behind the scenes photography. We bonded over a love for vintage faux fur and became firm friends so the work I make with Amy is as much a display of our friendship as it is about the relationship between muse and photographer.
Although we made this is 2016, I’ve revisited it in 2020 during the coronavirus days. This was part of my final uni project which explored what a ‘fashion image’ is and questioned the idea that second hand garments are fashion… sounds obvious in 2020 right? But even just a few years ago there wasn’t this media mainstream love for the second hand clothing market, on the street maybe, but in the magazines? Very little…
If you’re a brand, creative, a stylist or a magazine editor etc looking to make/commission work using second hand fashion please get in touch, because I really want to work with you to make this type of work!
See more work over on instagram
This is a WIP image (I think) I’m not sure where I’m going with it or if this is its final state?
This was taken at the end of 2019 in a session which was just to make some new work for me, Ramzan (pictured) and two other models Matt & India. There were a few ideas and a bit of styling using my vintage & second hand rail and ultimately when I looked back through the images it was like we’d rolled 4 or 5 different shoots in to one session, so it’s taken me a while to collate them and decide on what goes where. Like a lot of people lockdown has been a period where I’m really thinking about my direction and creative practice and the three threads which continue to run through a lot of my work and the work I’m interested in making is fashion history, music and movement.
Next week I will be returning to work from my studio. As the space is small I’m not expecting to work with other people inside for a little while, so I’ll be focusing on turning it into a research space, using the walls as an area to start collecting ideas and using mind mapping as a way to try and organise my thoughts.
I’m personally finding the world quite noisy right now, so I’m hoping letting some ideas flow, will be as useful as it is productive…
See more work over on instagram
“CREATIVITY IN CONFINEMENT” with Kerry Curl on the podcast Queer and The City
Strange times…
I sat down with Fashion Writer Jordan Wake, creator of the podcast Queer and The City to discuss life at the moment as we work our way through lockdown in the UK. In this podcast we chat about creative life, making work, the last London Fashion Week before lockdown, how we met, the value of creativity in cities beyond London, pondering about how the pandemic will impact creative life, does confinement produce creativity? my hybrid approach to making work, going to uni later in life, who would I invite to a dinner party and so much more…
If you’d like a listen please do hit the link below. Would really love to hear your thoughts so feel free to get in touch if you’d like to.
Listen to the podcast here
To discuss commissions or general enquires feel free to email me - hello@kerrycurl.com
Say hi on instagram
The image is one of a series which documents the dress rehearsal of the 2019 fashion performance of MILK by movement and fashion artist Amy Ollett.
I’ve worked with this artist several times to document her creative practice, we connect artistically with a shared interest in the exploration of movement.
Amy’s statement about the concept of MILK “I am lost in my physical anxiety, pressured as a woman to society. Suffocating in your version of my milk’s expiry.”
To join the work at such an intimate stage of its development thus being invited in to the creative process is a privilege. Whilst these images form a photo essay documenting the preparation of the performance, they also become part of our collaborative library of visual data for research and reflection purposes.
I met Amy in 2017. Amy had seen my work at my BA degree show and I’d seen her work at her MA show. Although we’d never met in person it turned out that we’d made a connection to the others work. An email from Amy led to a coffee and that that meet up sparked a creative relationship, one which means we can really develop and push our own boundaries through exploring each other’s creative practice. Since documenting MILK, I’ve continued to work with Amy as she develops her practice through returning to the exploration of movement using her own body.
Amy Ollett
Dancer Federica
See more work over on my instagram
I’ve decided to share some work on instagram in the form of a photo essay. You’re all invited to follow MILK by Amy Ollett, build over 21-25 June.
I’ve worked with the artist Amy Ollett several times to document her creative practice. We connect artistically with a shared interest in the exploration of movement. These images document the dress rehearsal of the 2019 fashion performance of MILK.
Amy’s statement about the concept of MILK “I am lost in my physical anxiety, pressured as a woman to society. Suffocating in your version of my milk’s expiry.”
To join the work at such an intimate stage of its development thus being invited in to the creative process is a privilege. Whilst these images form a photo essay documenting the preparation of the performance, they also become part of our collaborative library of visual data for research and reflection purposes. .
I met Amy in 2017. Amy had seen my work at my BA degree show and I’d seen her work at her MA show. Although we’d never met in person it turned out that we’d made a connection to the others exhibition pieces.
An email from Amy led to a coffee and that that meet up sparked a creative relationship, one which means we can really develop and push our own boundaries through exploring each other’s creative practice. Since documenting MILK, I’ve since worked with Amy as she develops her practice through returning to the exploration of movement using her own body.
Head over to my instagram
I’ve started an online print shop. It’s something I’ve been planning to do for a while, but these current times we find ourselves in have given my the nudge to do it.
I’m taking part in the #ArtistSupportPledge - when I reach £1000 of print sales, I pledge to spend £200 on buying work who by other artists who are taking part in this initiative. If you have seen an image not listed which you would like to discuss purchasing, please feel free to get in touch. Head over for a look and if you have any questions let me know.https://www.kerrycurl.com/kerrycurlshop
See more of my work on instagram
With exhibitions and work all pretty much being on hold for 2020, I decided to hold my own exhibition on my own instagram account. I wanted to use this as way to curate some work and share it purposefully, some kind of structure (which is not my attitude towards instagram at all) What I also wanted was something to focus on. Something to ease me back to thinking about creativity.
I know some people have found this period as a way to get creative, boost their output but for me it’s been an opportunity to step back and look at what I’ve been making. We are bombarded with images and there’s a constant rush to make new ones. Once over the initial shock of realising my practice isn’t especially pandemic friendly, I essentially took myself on a retreat, allowing myself to work at my own pace and flit between hard drives and images as the mood took me.
Then when I felt ready I decided to give myself a micro project of an IG exhibition, complete with poster, set dates and a planned sequence of images.
If you missed the instgram exhibition here are the images I shared, I’ll also link to my IG at the end of this journal entry. The exhibition showed work made whilst documenting the Vin + Omi Show at London Fashion Week (LFW) in Sept 2019. It was my last show of that season and I didn’t attend LFW in February 2020, so it is entirely possible with the way things have changed that these might be the last LFW images I make. We will see…
And here’s a few bonus images I shared via IG stories. I found curating this a real challenge, what to leave in, what to leave out, the sequencing… it really was a good distraction (and a challenge) from the constant rolling bad news coming through during lockdown. I enjoyed using my instagram in this way and I will definitely do it again.
I have A3 prints of the poster I created for the exhibition currently up for sale in my shop (yes I now have a shop, more prints being listed shortly) all profits from this print go to The Trussell Food Trust to support their network of foodbanks across the UK.
Visit the shop
To chat about work, ideas, ask questions or just say hi feel free to email me hello@kerrycurl.com
See more work over on my instagram
Today’s image is a portrait of Matt Hales.
We made a series of portraits on a photo walk in 2018, strolling around parks in London.
The lockdown is now lifting and I recently met with a friend in a park for a socially distanced chat. It was good to feel the grass underneath us and perhaps we’ll appreciate such simple sensations more from this point on. However the feeling of walking around without a care in the world still feels a distant memory. For now.
To chat about work, ideas or just say hi feel free to email me hello@kerrycurl.com
See more work over on my instagram
Matt’s instagram
