Canon have just announced their new Masters. Excited to be part of incredible group of artists and continue working with Canon.
MGA Bowness Photography Prize
William and Winifred Bowness Photography Prize. Selected from over 1,700 images from Australian artists, the Prize offers the winning work an award of $30,000 as well as inclusion into the Monash Gallery of Art’s nationally significant collection of Australian photographs. The Smith & Singer People’s Choice Award will be voted by the public with the recipient receiving $5,000. The annual survey of contemporary photographic practice in Australia is considered one of the most prestigious prizes in the country.
Telstra - Australia IS Why
Thrilled to photograph the new brand campaign for Telstra - Australia Is Why .
Thank you for everyone involved in producing this beautiful campaign.
Telstra has today announced a campaign to introduce its new brand positioning, Australia Is Why. The new campaign showcases the important role Telstra plays in supporting Australia and its diverse communities and was created by long-term agency partner, The Monkeys
Creative Agency: The Monkeys, part of Accenture Interactive
Group CEO & Co-Founder: Mark Green
Group Chief Creative Officer & Co-Founder: Scott Nowell
Chief Creative Officer: Tara Ford
Chief Strategy Officer: Fabio Buresti
Managing Director: Matt Michael
Executive Creative Director: Vince Lagana
Creative Directors: Dan Fryer, Stuart Alexander
Creative Team: Jake Rusznyak, Dennis Koutoulogenis, Ben Sampson
Head of Business Management: Belinda Drew
Senior Business Director: Amanda Porritt
Business Director: Jack Stone
Business Manager: Ciara Moloney, Samantha Packham
Head of Planning: Hugh Munro
Senior Planner: Charlotte Marshall
Head of Production: Penny Brown
Senior Producer: Simone O’Connor
Senior Producer: Claudia Brookes
Production Company: Red Door
Photographer: Paul Blackmore
Executive Producer: Natalie Loveridge
Retouching: Cream Electric Art
Olive Cotton Award Finalist
Happy to be a finalist in the Olive Cotton Award. The Olive Cotton Award is a $20,000 biennial national award for excellence in photographic portraiture in memory of photographer Olive Cotton. The exhibition is selected from entrants across Australia and is a significant opportunity for established and emerging photographers.The exhibition will be on display at Tweed Regional Gallery from 16 July – 19 September 2021, with the announcement of winners on Saturday 17 July, 5pm – 7pm.
Art Month Exhibition Opening - 'Ravel'
Opening Wednesday 10th March at the Twenty Twenty Six Gallery, Bondi.
Ravel explores the primordial need to connect and tangle oneself with another. Of radical intimacy -to be rendered as one.
Sculptural forms of entwined bodies laid bare on the beach under a ever hot sun.
Light l Fast Gallery Twenty Twenty Six
Thrilled to be part of the Gallery Twenty Twenty Six group show Light l Fast . Opens on the 26th Sept until 26th Oct.
2020 William and Winifred Bowness Photography Prize
So excited to share the news that I have been selected as a finalist in the '2020 William and Winifred Bowness Photography Prize’. The prize has become an important survey of contemporary photographic practice and one of the most prestigious prizes in the country.
Sef and Sin, On the last day of the year with the sky red from bushfires I wanted to celebrate my friends Stef and Sin who both live their lives with compassion and heart.
Heat - The Guardian
In his book Heat, the Sydney-based photographer Paul Blackmore pays homage to Australia’s obsession with the coast, exploring the relationship between water, heat and humanity. He documents the pursuit of individual freedom on crowded beaches during sweltering summer days and shoots the sea in its various guises – cool, dark and icy; a powerful force to be reckoned with; a backdrop to foggy Bondi mornings; and a stormy refuge for the wild at heart
The British Library acquires At Water's Edge for their collection.
Thrilled to have had the British Library acquire my 2012 book At Water’s Edge for their collection of photo books. Congratulations to Gianni and T&G Publishing .
Water Review - The Age & Sydney Morning Herald
The exhibition takes up the entire ground floor of the large gallery, and includes two especially massive works. Cai Guo-Qiang’s Heritage (2013) features life-sized pairs of animals sipping from a large water-filled pool, while in Olafur Eliasson’s Riverbed (2014), a creek runs through a rocky landscape recreated majestically within the gallery.For both works, a lot of hydraulic expertise has been involved to manage the volumes of water required. ‘‘Riverbed really appealed to me,’’ Barlow says. ‘‘With many museums, there is a desire to bring in immersive/interactive works in a way that can be quite spectacular and performative – but Riverbed is radically quiet, with all those stones and the greyness of it, and the purity. And I felt we needed at least one work where you can touch water.’’
Born to Icelandic parents in Denmark, Eliasson has said Riverbed is an attempt to capture the landscapes he visited in Iceland as a youth. Barlow links it, too, to the Australian experience of drought, but also to the beginning and end of time – the work seems primeval and apocalyptic in equal measure.
Working closely with Eliasson’s studio, the GOMA team used 3D modelling to install the work over eight weeks, beginning with a hand-cut timber-truss support frame lined with waterproofing material and ‘‘geotextile’’ fabric. All of this was covered with 100 tonnes of sand, small river pebbles and large hand-selected basalt rocks. The installation was underpinned by pump systems to regulate the flow of water through the channel.
While this ‘‘real’’ experience is bound to draw visitors, there are other equally profound moments on offer in Water. In his Heat (2018) series, Australian photographer Paul Blackmore considers water from a spiritual perspective. Blackmore, who has photographed water-based scenery for many years, recalls shooting the Kumbh Mela ritual, held in 12-year cycles at four riverbank pilgrimage sites in India. It attracts millions of Hindus.
‘‘Watching that mass of humanity going to the water for that spiritual cleansing, I could see clearly how water connects us to each other,’’ Blackmore says. ‘‘I swim every day – and for me it is like a baptism. There is a sense of renewal.’’
The Heat series was the first time Blackmore had shot photographs in the surf and below the water. ‘‘I had to fall into a rhythm with the ocean,’’ he says. ‘‘I had to anticipate how people were moving … it is a bit of a dance between you and the subject matter.’’
Water QAGOMA
WATER
07 DEC 2019 – 26 APR 2020
GOMA | GALLERY 1.1 THE FAIRFAX GALLERY, GALLERY 1.2, GALLERY 1.3 ERIC & MARION TAYLOR GALLERY | TICKETED
Thrilled to have work from series Heat included in the Water exhibition at QAGOMA .
When ‘Water’ opens this summer at GOMA, visitors are invited to explore this vital element which sustains all forms of life on Earth. From major immersive experiences to smaller-scale treasures by Australian and international artists, the exhibition will highlight this precious resource and aims to spark conversations about the environmental and social challenges we face today.
Discover more about the ‘Water’ exhibition with daily guided tours of the exhibition at 11.00am commencing 9 Dec
Feature in The Design Files
Australian Beach Culture Laid Bare
IN PRINT
Powerful yet fragile, the ocean is many things for many different Australians.
Photojournalist Paul Blackmore contemplates our ‘almost spiritual reliance’ on the water in his captivating new book, Heat.
In-between daily swims, the Sydney-based lensman spoke about this passion project, which has been four years, and a lot of underwater hours, in the making!
3rd July, 2019
The titular photography, ‘Heat’ From Paul Blackmore’s new series. Photo – Paul Blackmore.
The series was captured over four years from Bondi to Clovelly. Pictured here ‘Bondi’. Photo – Paul Blackmore.
‘Bondi lovers’ and ‘Flat Rock Bondi’. Photo – Paul Blackmore.
‘Icebergs Bondi’. Photo – Paul Blackmore.
‘Heat’ explores Australia’s cultural and spiritual reliance on our beaches and how the ocean connects us to ourselves, one another and our shared environment. Photo – Paul Blackmore.
‘I love shooting in and under the water – the way you have to be in sync with the rhythm of the ocean,’ tells Paul. Pictured here ‘Heat’. Photo – Paul Blackmore.
Elle MurrellWednesday 3rd July 2019
‘It was the feeling of going into the ocean and experiencing its redemptive power that inspired me to start this project’ – Paul Blackmore.
‘Australians have an almost spiritual reliance on the beach and the ocean,’ begins Paul Blackmore. ‘In a way, it is where we see our culture laid bare. We get to see a cosmopolitan confidence, a mingling of cultures and peoples from all backgrounds, a parade of vitality and harmony that creates a unique flavour.’
Over the past 25 years, the photojournalist has set out to create visual narratives about contemporary social issues, by photographing real people and environments in candid situations. His latest series, Heat, highlights the important connection Australians have with the water, as well as the power, beauty and fragility of nature in the age of climate change.
Photographed from Bondi to Clovelly, Heat ‘celebrates the intense beauty, the rhythms of the ocean, and the people who swim in it,’ details the avid ocean swimmer. ‘For me, the act of immersing myself into the enormity of the ocean is like a secular baptism; a cleansing of the mind and body. It was the feeling of going into the ocean and experiencing its redemptive power that inspired me to start this project.’
Much of the series was captured using waterproof housing and a ‘fairly simple’ set-up of two cameras and a couple of lenses, which allowed for shooting in the surf or underwater, yet maintaining the high quality of large-format cameras. Final editing and production took place in Paul’s shared studio, located in the beautiful old Marlborough Building in Surry Hills.
The Sydney native started out shooting with his Dad’s Nikon at aged 14. ‘Taking photos became the way I engaged with the world and became my way of communicating,’ he recalls. Before long, the family laundry was transformed into a darkroom and his bedroom walls were plastered with photos cut from Time and National Geographic. As a fresh Philosophy and Economics graduate, Paul took off on a formative solo roadtrip to Darwin through Queensland and Arnhem Land. Over five months, he spent his days photographing people on cattle stations and in remote communities. That series became Paul’s first book, the widely-published Australians: Response to the Land. ‘Most importantly It gave me the sense that I can do this; I have worked as a photographer for the last 25 years,’ he tells.
Subsequent passion projects like At Water’s Edge, and the recent Heat, have come to life alongside Paul’s commercial commissions, which have taken the photographer all over the world. He has worked with the likes of Time, Le Monde, L’Express, Good Weekend, Vogue, Marie Claire and on advertising campaigns for Qantas, Telstra, Apple, Google, Westpac, and Woolworths.
‘The most exciting part of photography is that it allows you to explore worlds that you might not normally experience. Even though Heat was shot in my own backyard, it took me on an obsessive creative journey, where every time I photographed it felt new and fresh,’ says the Tamarama local. Paul is ecstatic to share this journey with others, for it’s also one that aligns with his entire approach to his profession: ‘create from the heart, make it personal, and never stop experimenting’.
Turning through Heat is a profound reminder of how the ocean is intertwined with life in Australia – connecting us to ourselves, one another, and our unique environment.
See more of Paul Blackmore’s work on his website Paulblackmore.com or by following on Instagram @paulblackmorephoto (his next project will take him to Beirut, Lebanon). ‘Heat’ is available to purchase here, and works from the series GOMA’s blockbuster exhibition ‘Water‘ later this year.
New Work - Telstra Prepaid - The Monkeys
Thrilled to work on this brilliant campaign for Telstra by The Monkeys.
Creative Agency: The Monkeys
Group CCO & Co-Founder: Scott Nowell
Creative Director: Jo Sellars
Senior Copywriter: Barnaby Packham
Art Director: Danny Pattison
Business Strategy Director: Hugh Munro
Business Director: Toby Hussey
Account Director: Samar Karim
Senior Account Manager: Jack Stone
Senior Integrated Producer: Sally Lankshear Print
Producer Alex Watson
Red Door Productions Natalie Loveridge
Heat - Capture Magazine
Review in The Australian Photographers Journal
Heat - Good Weekend
Queensland Opera
Out now is a campaign we did for Queensland Opera’s 2019 programme.
Make Up by the super talented Sarah Laidlaw
Creative by Paul Clark and Belinda Rabe @ Alphabet Studios
Produced by Natalie Loveridge
Patrick Nolan Queensland Opera
Assistants Isaac Maclurcan and John Kung
Heat - Photo Review Magazine
A nice interview and article in the next edition of Photo Review about my upcoming book Heat that will be launched next May as part of the Head On Festival.
Heat at Chapter One
I will be showing a few works from the series Heat that I am currently working on. Thanks to Simone and Justin Drape for putting on the show.
Together, It's Magic
I was thrilled to photograph the amazing Thelma Plum for Telstra's latest campaign 'Together, It's Magic' with Apple via The Monkeys.
Creative Agency: The Monkeys
Cofounder & Creative Director: Justin Drape
Creative Team: Hugh Gurney, Chelsea Parks & Wassim Kanaan
Head of Production: Thea Carone
Content Director: Katie Bassett
Photography Production Company - Red Door
Producer - Natalie Loveridge
Agency Producer – Tanith Williamson
Retouching - Cream Electric Art
Digi Op Diego Jose
Assistants Isaac Maclurcan & Jeremy Graham
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