LIGHT JOURNEYS

It is with a sense of great promise for the future of Australian women working in photography that we, the co-founders and curators of Light Journeys, have decided to wind down new features on the website. The experience of curating Light Journeys and engaging with a fantastic community of artists has left us with much joy and pride.

Over the years many people have expressed curiosity about our own photography and what led us to develop this site. So we felt that perhaps the most appropriate way to say goodbye is with some insight into the way the creative practice of photography plays out in our own lives. Consequently, the last two features of Light Journeys will be us.

Thanks to all of you for looking, participating in and supporting this site.

Ursula and Lee are proud to announce that Light Journeys has been nominated for a 2013 Edna Ryan Award. Edna Ryan was an Australian feminist activist who worked hard to receive equal pay for women and in general worked towards making a better world. The EDNAs were developed in her honour and are “for women who have made a feminist difference, i.e. whose activity advances the status of women: the battlers and the unsung heroines who show commitment and determination.” To learn more about Edna Ryan and the Edna Ryan awards please visit http://www.ednaryan.net.au

Light Journeys founder and co-curator Lee Grant is exhibiting a selection of her series Belco Pride on home turf at the Belconnen Arts Centre from 28th September to 14th October 2012. A small number of advanced copies of the book will also be available ahead of the release date of late November. Pre-orders are being taken, please contact Lee via her website:

Yeti, 2010 U.K. Frederick

The Season of Tall Shadows
It slips up on us slowly, first emerging as dwindling daylight and stretching shadows. Gradually it turns to fog, cloudy skies, skeletal trees and in some places frost on the windscreen. In the north of the continent it comes as something of a respite from the humidity and heat. Winter occupies an awkward presence in the Australian imagination. How do we reconcile our experience of this season against the iconic image of bright light and heat? Is there anything distinctly Australian about this time of year?

Light Journeys is seeking submissions for a group feature on the topic of Winter. All women working in Australian photography, including previously featured artists, are invited to submit 1-3 photographs for consideration. Submissions are due September 1, 2012.

Support this innovative and important project:

See Jane Run is a new photographic project exploring gender roles, beauty ideals and body image. Established by four female photographers – Emma Phillips, Julie Sundberg, Anna Warr and Fiona Wolf – our aim for this project is to evoke dialogue about how we see and perceive ourselves, and how society and the media influences that perception, especially towards women.

Light Journeys artists Petrina Hicks, Michelle Tran and Katrin Koenning are all featured in BigCityPress’ new publication Hijacked III.

Currently exhibiting at PICA in Perth, WA and QUAD in Derby, UK.

House, a new book and an exhibition opening 15 October 2011 at the Museum of Sydney features the stunning still-life photography by Robyn Stacey, showcasing the extraordinary and everyday objects from the Historic Houses Trust’s collections and properties.

These exquisite photographs are the result of a four-year collaboration between the Historic Houses Trust (HHT) and Stacey who gained unprecedented access to the more than 29,000 objects held in the collections of Elizabeth Bay House, Vaucluse House, Rouse Hill House & Farm and the Caroline Simpson Library & Research Collection.

The exhibition will feature over 15 of Stacey’s striking images, a selection of objects from each of the properties and a slide-show revealing the intricate process behind each photograph.

Vikky Wilkes will be exhibiting her series Last Light in Gallery 2 at the Queensland Centre for Photography from 24th September through to 23rd October 2011.

Last Light is a series of photographs investigating the final hour of light on the shores of Lake Ginninderra in Canberra. Photographed between January and March 2009, which included the Australia Day long weekend, the series documents the cultural and social diversity of the people who visit the lake and the ways they interact with it. The photographs capture the mood associated with the season and time of day. In a world suspended between night and day we find a place familiar to all: declarations of love on a tree trunk; couples embracing; people seeking a leisurely pace. These moments are a testimony to a passage in time, a connection between past and present elaborated through the landscape.

Untitled 2 (courtesy Vikky Wilkes)

Claire Martin is showing her series Slab City at the ACP in Sydney. Opening is Thursday 1 September (tomorrow!) from 6pm and the exhibition opens to the public on Friday, running through to the 25th September.

All welcome…

© Claire Martin, Leonard Knight and his Salvation Mountain, Slab City 2009

In the Colorado Desert of South Eastern California, Slab City serves as a refuge for what society may ordinarily perceive as misfits or outcasts yet with her lens Australian photographer Claire Martin discovered a community of people who understood each other. Unberable temperature highs in summer weeded out the many who inhabited the free space in winter leaving only the most resilient, or the most unfortunate, as residents.

Taking its name from the concrete slabs that remain from an abandoned World War II base it is a tragic yet romantic landscape that commands this small but committed group of squatters to possess the same balance of beauty and beast.

Light Journeys artist, Michelle Tran is exhibiting new work at Kings Artist Run Initiative in Melbourne. The show opens on the 8th July and runs through to the 30th July.