News
Feature on 'Intimate Perspectives on North Korea' in Hong Kong's HK01
Read here (in Chinese)
Intimate Perspectives on North Korea on Leica Magazine China
Read here (if you understand Chinese)
DPRK work featured in Photo News, Hong Kong
Read here (in Chinese)
North Korean Images at Tbilisi Photo Festival's Night of Photography
Festival and photographer details here
North Korean work on Mashregh News (Iran)
Here (in Farsi however)
South Korean publication steals and misrepresents my images
South Korean blog 'Insight' first steals my images, then attributes quotes to me that are utterly false. The person who wrote it, named Kyoo Jeong (황규정 기자) is a thief and a liar. Not surprising perhaps, but more than a little pathetic when people in the ROK feel they need to lower themselves to this level - just stick to the facts for God's sake.
Q&A with Sally Brownbill on documentary work and the DPRK
View here on The Brownbill Effect
'Islands in the Stream' Japan series in LensCulture Magazine
View here (opens link in new window)
Blink membership
Pleased to have been invited to join Blink.
'True North' Exhibition as part of Head On Photo Festival 2015
Showing at LOWROAD Gallery, Sydney (opens link in new window)
Blue Burqa in a Sunburnt Country in Mindfood Magazine
Beautiful story in Mindfood's birthday issue
April Exhibition at Michael Reid Sydney. Wall Power: Significant Contemporary Australian Photography
Blue Burqa images in a major group show with Nici Cumpston, Marian Drew, Petrina Hicks, Catherine Nelson, Joseph McGlennon, Fabian Muir, Deborah Paauwe, Joan Ross and Christian Thompson, 1 - 25 April, 2015
Blue Burqa in Konbini's Top Ten for 2014
Very happy to see it named amongst Konbini's Top Ten Photos for 2014 (opens link in new window)
Blue Burqa in a Sunburnt Country in The Guardian
Thrilled by the wonderful series gallery prepared and published in the Culture section of The Guardian's global edition (UK/US/Aus) - see it here (opens link in new window)
Blue Burqa in a Sunburnt Country in Gillian Serisier's article on Raven Contemporary
Read this extremely interesting discussion by Gillian Serisier on the power of the Internet versus physical exhibitions and the traditional vernissage with reference to Blue Burqa in a Sunburnt Country here (opens link in new window)
Statement on Blue Burqa in a Sunburnt Country
This series has generated quite some discussion and divided opinion in some quarters. While the overall response has - happily - been very positive and demonstrated an understanding of my aims, there are also critical voices whose reaction, it appears, is based largely on a knee-jerk abhorrence for this garment.
Without by any means denying such critics their right to robustly express their views, I would like to encourage them to think a little more deeply about the metaphorical values I attempted to apply in compiling the series. Ultimately I am hoping that the series strikes a nuanced and optimistic tone in the questions it raises, and I would like to see it contribute to a thoughtful dialogue on a range of difficult but highly relevant issues. Either way, it is not a paean to the virtues of the burqa, and I am surprised that anyone who has read my original artist's statement might interpret the series thus.
On that basis, I'm reproducing below the artist's statement as it first appeared on LensCulture, which I hope explains my objectives quite clearly:
"For Westerners, the burqa is a garment pregnant with symbolism. This series, shot in 2014 during a 10,000 kilometre journey in Australia, seeks to take the symbolism beyond the typical connotations of sexism and repression, and into a more metaphorical landscape that raises questions of migration, assimilation and belonging. Along the way, the burqa also reveals a luminous, ethereal beauty one might not normally have expected.
Marrying the burqa with Australia’s severe environment would not seem an obvious choice at first. However, it makes sense for those who are aware of the current Australian government’s strict anti-immigration policies and handling of refugees, and indeed the ongoing discussion of a 'burqa ban' in the country. These faceless, ‘anonymous’ people, who come to Australian shores in search of a new beginning, are either turned away as they arrive or thrust into a harsh, suburnt country. They quickly feel displaced, leading to predictable tensions.
However, despite the sense of isolation in the images, the aesthetic symbiosis between the burqa and the challenging landscapes hints at a potential for the two worlds to co-exist and even complement each other in ways not imagined. Perhaps Australia and these 'new Australians' are not as mismatched as the government and some members of the public seem to think.
The burqa’s journey in this series – whose title is borrowed from Australia’s best-known poem, My Country – surely offers more questions than answers, but ultimately it is intended as a series of hope."
Without by any means denying such critics their right to robustly express their views, I would like to encourage them to think a little more deeply about the metaphorical values I attempted to apply in compiling the series. Ultimately I am hoping that the series strikes a nuanced and optimistic tone in the questions it raises, and I would like to see it contribute to a thoughtful dialogue on a range of difficult but highly relevant issues. Either way, it is not a paean to the virtues of the burqa, and I am surprised that anyone who has read my original artist's statement might interpret the series thus.
On that basis, I'm reproducing below the artist's statement as it first appeared on LensCulture, which I hope explains my objectives quite clearly:
"For Westerners, the burqa is a garment pregnant with symbolism. This series, shot in 2014 during a 10,000 kilometre journey in Australia, seeks to take the symbolism beyond the typical connotations of sexism and repression, and into a more metaphorical landscape that raises questions of migration, assimilation and belonging. Along the way, the burqa also reveals a luminous, ethereal beauty one might not normally have expected.
Marrying the burqa with Australia’s severe environment would not seem an obvious choice at first. However, it makes sense for those who are aware of the current Australian government’s strict anti-immigration policies and handling of refugees, and indeed the ongoing discussion of a 'burqa ban' in the country. These faceless, ‘anonymous’ people, who come to Australian shores in search of a new beginning, are either turned away as they arrive or thrust into a harsh, suburnt country. They quickly feel displaced, leading to predictable tensions.
However, despite the sense of isolation in the images, the aesthetic symbiosis between the burqa and the challenging landscapes hints at a potential for the two worlds to co-exist and even complement each other in ways not imagined. Perhaps Australia and these 'new Australians' are not as mismatched as the government and some members of the public seem to think.
The burqa’s journey in this series – whose title is borrowed from Australia’s best-known poem, My Country – surely offers more questions than answers, but ultimately it is intended as a series of hope."