Luminance: Photographs by Peter Clayfield
8 Jan - 2 Feb
Opening Saturday 11 January 6-8pm
“To me, photography is the art of observation. It’s about finding something interesting in an ordinary place. I’ve found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.” – Elliott Erwitt
Wandering with my camera helps me find meaning in my own life through a visual enquiry into the world I experience around me. Interpreting this world through a camera lens allows me to create my own dreamy minimalist universe.
The images in this exhibition continue my exploration of the primary concerns that have always informed my work: an interest in form, lighting and strong compositional elements. Many of my photographs have at their heart, an observation of the play of light, how it falls on the subject, how it delineates form and how it creates contrast and visual impact.
I think a successful photograph should ‘tell a story’ in order to establish an emotional connection with those that see it. I hope that some of my photographs create a visceral response that rings true inside the viewer.
I have always been deeply moved by the power and beauty of the natural environment and have attempted to convey something of this in my landscape studies. In some images I have utilised infrared techniques to elicit an ethereal, dreamlike quality. Some subjects appear to radiate an inner ‘luminosity’ that for me speaks to the sacred connection we share with the land. Some of my images also speak to the loss of this connection.
My Street Photography images flow from an interest in how people interact with their surroundings and the way in which they relate to the forms around them. I was inspired early on by the photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson and his notion of ‘The Decisive Moment’- He wrote: “For me, photography is the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event”. By freezing a moment of action when the various elements align at a critical point of balance, through careful framing and adept timing, a more eloquent and compelling image can result.
I hope that these photographs in some small way continue his legacy, and that they convey something of the interconnectedness of all people and all living things.