S2, E12 - Jenny Nash

Jenny Nash is a photographer based in London, England, but originally from Leeds in Yorkshire. Jenny talks about the importance of photography in their life. They are a documentary and protest photographer. Jenny began as a documentary and protest photographer which took them all over London in an attempt to document specifically LGBTQ+ Pride and their work with Stand Up To Racism. The episode was recorded in April 2022. 

Jenny's social media:
Insta: @_SRPhotography

Podcast details:
Podcast email: artiststalespodcast@gmail.com
Website: www.artiststales.net
Instagram: @artists_tales_podcast
Threads: @artists_tales_podcast

Transcript

0:01

you Welcome listeners to Artist Tales, the podcast that features and celebrates artists from different walks of life. I'm your host Heather Martin, and in this episode I'm speaking with Jenny Nash, who's a photographer based in London, but originally from Leeds in Yorkshire. Welcome Jenny. Hi Heather. So tell me a little bit about yourself and your photography, and how you got started. So yeah, well, as you said, I'm from Leeds because somebody's gotta be from Leeds. Yeah in Yorkshire. Yeah and I came to London for university in 2014 and I haven't left since. How I got started I kind of, when I came to university I wasn't really, I wasn't in a good place really. I had quite a difficult kind of upbringing I guess like quite a lot of challenges and... But I'd always like taking photographs and I think I kind of saw uni as all free money, student finance, I can run off to London and just sort of escape who I was and whatever. And I was quite self-destructive and kind of, I think photographer Rosie Martin once described when she was younger she said she courted displeasure and I think that is probably a good way to describe me as well. But yeah. Long story short, I did my BA in 2014 and through having really the most incredible teachers who sort of went above and beyond, probably recognised that I was a bit of a mess and I was involved in a few self-destructive habits, shall we say, that weren't great for me. They kind of pushed me along and really gave me quite a lot of like self-belief. Yeah, and they basically inspired me to sort of do something with my life and change my life and I really owe them everything after that point because I really think I was on the like a crossroad at that time of like my life was gonna go really badly or end abruptly or I was still gonna be here today so yeah it was kind of down to that but I'd always taken photographs always like when I was a kid I was a teenager I always had to have the mobile phone with the best camera or even when I was little I used to have the little disposable camera that I would take around and snap and my mum would go to Boots and get my pictures developed and that kind of thing. So yeah, images have always been a been a really important part of my life. I think I've sort of realised that that's because I think Nan Goldin said she used to take photographs of people and places I think. because then she thought she would never lose them, but actually you do and having the photos kind of remind you of what you lost in a way. So I think I was in this kind of weird cycle as a young person of taking all these photos and desperately trying to save everything and I couldn't, you know, because things change, things move on and that was kind of like a vicious cycle, I guess. Whereas now, I kind of, photography is, it is therapeutic for me, and we'll probably talk about that more later, but I think what I do creatively now is kind of, I use photography to explore ideas of what home means. I'm really interested in that idea of home is where the heart is, because that's not necessarily always true. Landscape is a huge thing for me, because obviously I come from Yorkshire, you know, there's lots of gorgeous landscape there. I have a funny kind of relationship with where I'm from so that's something I'm exploring but I am a documentary and protest photographer as well so photography is a way to convey messages or feelings or kind of I think everything we photograph is a self-portrait a photographer said to me once so I think everything that I do I'm just sort of trying to inject some energy into the work. beyond sort of pressing the shutter and or developing a film I guess. I kind of want to see what's behind under the surface of a picture I guess and it's a way to kind of discover more about yourself and various selves that we have inside us. But yeah and I like that kind of exploration of photographic representations of people and places and because that's always you know like I say was always changing and... it's fluid and it evolves and I do some mixed media stuff as well, some sculptural stuff, photographic objects, which is kind of me having a go at creating the imperfect image I guess. How much has the struggle in your life influenced your art, you know, whether it's photography or the mixed media or whatever, how much has that influenced you? And I think as I was saying that too... how much of it was the release because he said that the taking, particularly taking pictures, was kind of therapeutic. So how much, I mean, because I know some, a lot of artists, maybe not all, but many artists, kind of what they've been through and what they've experienced, can influence how they see things and how they, you know, express themselves in art. I assume you mean. Yeah, but also kind of like from the sounds of it, and you can correct me if I'm wrong. It almost was like a release for you with all the other things that you were, you know, experiencing. I guess, like I said before, like when I first sort of came to London and my poor teachers didn't realize what they'd taken on, you know, accepted onto their BA photography course, I think I was quite an angry person. And I think, and it's funny because I actually had a BA teacher who Still to this day, he's a pretty angry guy, like he always shaking his fist at the world. And I think that that's one of the things that he actually taught me, inadvertently. He would probably disagree with this, is that it's easier to be angry than to be sad, I think. I think that's why, you know, people can be so angry all the time. And I think there was quite an interesting thing that... So the actor Jim Carrey said that he's an actor because he's broken and what his art, acting, allows him to kind of, I think he said reconfigure all those broken pieces and he also said something about, I think he said that artists when they get hurt they try and turn that into something really beautiful. And I think that's what I kind of try to do. I don't want to be maudlin, I don't want to be dwellin, I don't want to be, oh, this bad stuff happened to me, poor me, that kind of thing. If I ever make a very personal piece of work, my artist statement is always very, it's about my method. It's kind of, until very recently, I actually exhibited three parts of a series where I had to, because of the nature of the work, because it was raising awareness of something. I had to say what the project was about and I never do that. That is the first time I've done it. I was very scared to do it. I was very nervous and I had some fantastic people around me supporting me. Lovely Lizzie Brown who's a wonderful photographer and Mal Walford as well and Eve Milner and Yeah, and that was pretty tough for me. But I don't want to, like I say, I don't want to be shouting at an audience, an audience not coming around an exhibition to go to be your therapist or be your pseudo parents that you're projecting this aggression onto or maybe a lost past love or somebody who you're pissed at. Do you know what I mean? So I'm always very general with my artist statements. I'll talk about method or theory or research. I don't say... this project was about me when I was 10 and this happened or when I was 15 or whatever. Because I think like when somebody, you can become like chronic outrage or chronic anger is a very real thing and people don't realise that. Like and a lot of people do become chronically angry or outraged through suffering trauma. And being angry as a person or hurt can actually be protective because it's a it's like a proactive way that we kind of seek out potential threat to us if that makes sense. But being chronically angry all the time or outraged it leads to like really bad stress burning out because you're pouring out all this endless like aggressive emotion and being angry at something or shouting at walls. I used to do a lot of, when I was a teenager, I used to do a lot of shouting at walls because I didn't have the kind of the guts to say it to people that hurt me. Or I knew that if I did, I would be in a lot of serious trouble. So I didn't. So I did a lot of shouting at walls when my mum was at work. When I used to get home from school, you know, I used to do a lot of shouting at walls or kind of talking to myself. Like I would kind of, there'd be nobody else around and I would say all these things I wanted to say to people. I'm kind of going all around the houses, but what I kind of was trying to say was that you burn out, people get so stressed or burn out because of this stuff and they're, because they're unconsciously trying, in their unconscious they're trying to rise above their own trauma. And that's why processing trauma, and it doesn't always work for everybody, not everybody is creative or artistically inclined, but like processing trauma through art practice or in my case photography. is absolutely critical for me to create inner peace and ultimately for me to be in control of myself as well. And I am diagnosed with bipolar so I mean my moods can go very up and down you know even though I have to take medication so that's my way of keeping me level and but you can't get that control what I've learnt is I can't get that. control and I've found other people have said this you can't get that control until you recognize your own pain and you're willing to face it and you're willing to deal with it and You know everybody deserves that you know you do Anybody listening to this does like everyone deserves that and I think that's what art and photography Can can do for people I think if that makes sense It does. And while I was listening, I was going to ask you, it sounds like the photography and the art allows you to process a lot of that trauma, the anger and whatever other emotions that you're working through or feeling, but also just, you know, to your point about not saying too much in the artist statements. I'm a bit like that as well. Not that I necessarily work through the same thing as you, but can do it. I mean, I think it can be cathartic, as you said, but also it's the thing I'm... I'm also conscious of is the viewer because the people who come to see it will interact it, you know, they'll take away their own interpretation of it. And I don't like to say too, too much because I want that person to kind of take away what they want. And I just want to ask you kind of where in your mind does the, you know, when you are exhibiting, where in your mind do you think the, you know, the viewer is or does that matter? Do you just kind of show stuff and yourself really or yeah because I guess it's that interaction with the viewer who comes to see the exhibition. No it's interesting you bring that up because I did some, I do work with self-portraiture not as much as I used to but I have worked with self-portraiture in the back when I was on my MA and Rosie Martin who was one of the developers of Phototherapy with Joe Spence in the 80s, she was very helpful on this but when I was doing these self-portraits and Consequently, subsequently when I've done other quite dark looking work, it does drum up emotions in people that come and see it and they sort of project their own meaning onto it Which is what I kind of like about the vague artist statements Like I don't want to say oh this image is about this Because I'd quite like somebody to come and it means something to them and they project onto it And I always find that interesting like I had a self-portrait where a man spoke to me at an exhibition and he was really emotional and he actually bought a print and he said oh this reminds me of hands down of my gender reassignment surgery and he was like it's just so perfect and he was telling me all the reasons why well I'm I've never you know that portrait is not about gender reassignment surgery I've never had gender reassignment surgery you know so it was absolutely nothing to do with that but that was his projection that was his thing but also I think there's a responsibility within that as well because I once had a woman at an exhibition absolutely lose it. Not the private view, thank goodness, because I wouldn't have wanted us to be around that many people but she absolutely lost it. She was triggered so badly by one of my portraits and it reminded her of actually sexual abuse that she'd gone through. Which again my picture wasn't about. but she was triggered so badly she just had this massive meltdown in the gallery and I was there which I was quite glad about I was invigilating that day and it was actually that I mean I ended up we ended up the get the gallerist ended up calling a family member to come and pick her up because she was really and I did stay in touch with her to be fair and we follow each other on Instagram but I suddenly realised, oh, this is quite a responsibility if I'm going to talk about certain things that can trigger people. You know, I then ended up doing a certificate and I decided to go and do an online course in how to deal with people who are having panic attacks or that they're triggered by, you know, something traumatic or... So if I ever am around and... I managed to upset somebody. At least I can take a bit of responsibility, do you know what I mean? But me and that woman, we did have a very long conversation about things and she was very, I mean she felt terrible, she felt awful, like she ruined our day and I was like no, you know, it's amazing that somebody had a strong reaction to it but at the same time it was kind of, she said it was kind of a relief because she could kind of... Oh, here's a picture that describes what I can't describe, you know, which to me was like, like that's just, that's pretty amazing for somebody to suddenly have a way to kind of describe something they haven't had the words for, if that makes sense. Like it was horrible. It had to happen that way. But you know, yeah, I thought that was pretty amazing. It was an amazing thing, I think. What I'm hearing is in a way you've given someone a voice or a way to kind of voice an aspect of herself that she perhaps struggled to voice or to express. And in a way it made me think of a BBC program with Mary Beard, who is a former, I think she was former dean at Cambridge. She's a classicist and it's about in, it was about forbidden art actually. She has a few programs on BBC. But an aspect of it was really fundamentally about art that challenges us and often art that gets censured. But I think in many ways what you're describing is probably art that can challenge us and how do we deal with that. And as you say, you know, as artists, what responsibility do we have to present art, but also push the boundaries and challenge things in society? And I'm just thinking there have been so many different types of arts and different artists that have pushed the boundaries. what's acceptable and what's not. You know, she's bringing up, you know, pieces of art that challenged maybe 30, 40 years ago, that today we're like, and? But it's just kind of that role of art. And it's really interesting to hear you talk about that and the responsibility of artists as well. Well, that's the thing. It's like, so if I'm gonna use that picture as an example, that picture particularly that she had a reaction to, or even that series, that was me, that was photography giving me a voice where I was shouting at the wall. But actually inadvertently what I did was actually give somebody else a voice as well. And I think that's important That's one of the things I think Contesting the existing discourse around what photography is really important because there's this huge hang-up about oh You know, let's face it. I think maybe somebody might correct me But photography is only really being considered an art form for like what 50 years maybe 60. I don't know And at the beginning it was like, oh, only black and white film photography is art. Digital is not art, you know? It's, colour is not. It was always black and white. And then there's that toss up between, there's always that argument around, oh, is it science or is it art? Or, you know, what it is because we're using chemicals. Well, artists used to make their own paints, okay? You know, it's like, but it is that challenge. And it's like, I think anything outside of the box, You know, it's like people think it has to be a flat print in a frame on a wall to be considered art. I had that massive conversation with Ian McLaren, who's an absolutely fabulous photographer. He's in the Venice Biennale at the moment. There's Rashida Manjera, who was in a show that I curated, who do these kind of like sculptural, you know, photographic objects or sculptural things. And I think that is so valid, but it gets labelled as fine art. And people have such a kind of boxed in view of what photography is. It's like I get sick to death of, so I mentioned Joe Spence and Rosie Martin earlier, the amount of times you hear people, and I'm talking academics, quote unquote, photography experts, whoever, talk about the self-portraiture of Joe Spence, it wasn't self-portraiture. It's... I mean technically in technical terms it wasn't because her and Rosie Martin and other people and Rosie works with other people now photographing each other so in a technical sense it wasn't self-portraiture as we think of it but their photographs were portraits of the self which they were photographing different selves and people find that really hard to get their heads round that oh that's therapy that's psychology that's... psychotherapy that's not, you know, proper photography and that it's just, I find that really gutting because photography is like this fluid, like I was talking about objects, like living, breathing objects, you know. I exhibited a piece in Crouch End not longer and it was an A3 piece, mixed media piece, it had broken glass and photographing it and goodness knows what else, it was one of those mad moments of making that I had and... It was up there on the wall and it was finished quote unquote. And then I found out from somebody who visited the show, who was a frame expert, that the frame was a 1930s frame. And I just found that frame lent up against a bin in London fields in Hackney, you know. And it would, but that was amazing. And this guy used this term, oh, it's like you're touching the past. Which, and that's totally without him knowing any background to that. So it's like, it's this really, you know, photography doesn't necessarily have to be flat print, it doesn't, it goes so much beyond that, you know, and beyond pretty landscapes and pretty still lives or like there's so much other stuff under the surface, do you know what I mean? There is, and I know some of the people you mentioned and, you know, I've been to the Crouch End exhibition you mentioned as well, which is in North London. So yeah, it is, I think there is that. Like a lot of art, you know, there's a lot of overlap between, you know, different mediums. And I've spoken to other artists who are, who wouldn't describe themselves as just a painter, or just this, or just that, or just the next thing. You know, it's kind of like, do mixed media, or, and I spoke to someone for the series who said, I'm a maker, which is a lovely way of saying it. And it's just kind of recognizing that she makes things and, you know. She does different things and it's just that kind of idea. But I think too, art can get very pigeonholed and then it's gonna become stale. But I think what art photography, whether it's photography or other mediums, can also, just that fluid, but it also can challenge the discourse of the day. It can challenge Moore's and Norm's and that sort of thing, which, and quite powerfully, and it's interesting about the Mary Beard program that I talked about that. often that stuff gets censured at the time. Yeah. And yet it then becomes acceptable quite often, or I don't know quite often, but you know, then it's kind of like, oh, okay, what was the fuss about and things move on, which I, so I think it kind of that fluidity in art and photography and other mediums kind of reflects society and the fluidity of society as well. Well, it's like, I think as well, cause I do process photography as well. And it's like, I mean, I photograph. every protest, whether I agree with what's been demonstrated about or not, I go far right, far left and everything in between because I want my protest archive to reflect the time that I lived in. I don't want it to just be one-sided, you know, I want it to be a documentation and you know as much as I, oh I absolutely love going to far right demos, you know what I mean? It's like... You know, I don't want to be around those kind of people. I don't want to be around that kind of language. I don't want to be at the Travestock Centre with people moaned in outside about, you know, transgender reassignment therapy being child abuse. Like it's just ignorance. It's vile. And I don't enjoy that. And I don't want anyone to think I enjoy being at an EDL rally, but that's what I want people to know. I want it to be like a documentation. But I think we do have. saying about representation, we have a responsibility. I think for example, if you're, you know, if you've got any of the major privileges, so if you're heterosexual, if you're cisgender, if you're white, if you're male, you know, not necessarily all of the above, but I'm saying, you know, one or two or, you know, I'm white, for example, you know, which is a huge privilege. We have a responsibility to push the conversation forward through our photography. until we're all equal and those people who, in my case I'm not gay, but I have a lot of friends who are and you know some of my best friends in the world and I feel like I have you know somebody who's never going to be challenged on adopting children. I'm gonna, I would be able to get married to a man and it'd be called a marriage not a civil partnership. I'm never gonna have a church turn me away. never gonna have a bakery turn me away because they won't make my wedding cake. Do you know what I mean? I don't have to be scared of who I hold hands in the street with. So I think to take that as one example of privilege, I have a duty and I think we all do in my process photography when I back things like LZEQQ rights, that I have a responsibility to push that conversation forward through photography. until we're all equal and so that then those people who do experience that have a platform equal to mine to talk about that are because until we're all equal then nobody is as far as I'm concerned if not all religions, races, you know colors, sexualities, genders, whatever until we're all equal no one is you know it's kind of that if they can keep us divided and split up and arguing with each other and hating on each other instead of hating on the people we should be hating on, not naming any names, then yeah, that's the way they control us, you know? It's like animal farm, do you know what I mean? So I do think that representation is really, really important. Really important. And to be fair, we... everybody has probably more in common than they think. Yeah, no, definitely. If we spent more time... do you know what one of my favorite quotes of all time is? There's this wonderful quote where... two characters in a film and I remember this I was like what nine eight or nine years old there's two characters in a film and one of them looks up at the sky and says something and the other one says yeah you're right the sky is really beautiful tonight and this character says you know we share so many things we share the same earth you know the same sky same air imagine if we spent more time looking at what we had in common than what was different you know what I mean? And it's this beautiful little moment in this film and it's from Mewtwo Strikes Back which was the first Pokemon film. And I can remember seeing that whenever it came out in the cinema when I was like 8 or 9 or whatever. And yeah, that's always stuck with me, you know, and that's a kids film. So I've always remembered that and that's the thing I try to, I do try to look at that even with people that I disagree with or I don't get on with or people who are not particularly nice to me or, you know, just I do try to... try and focus on some of the things we have in common, you know, rather than just getting cross, I guess. Keeping that anger in mind we were talking about. You know, I don't think not having anger is healthy, but I think having that anger in check maybe, or balanced perhaps. Yeah, definitely, definitely. What influences you or who influences you as an artist? So when I was a kid, when I was little... So I've always been a weird kid. I'm not gonna lie about it. I've always been weird. Like, you know, when my mates were reading Twilight when I was a teenager, I was reading Catriona Rai, you know. When my mates had Zac Efron on their posters on their walls, I had like that all that kind of thing, high school musical, all that stuff. There's just, you know, I was watching Edward Scissorhands when they were watching high school musical Nightmare Before Christmas, do you know what I mean? Like... But I always felt that. I always felt that was weird. I always felt that was different. I always felt there was more to life than talking about cute boys and cute iPhone covers. And I wanted to talk about politics and, you know, Marxism and listen to Noam Chomsky, read Noam Chomsky books or whatever. And there were two of the main people that got me through that as a very young person, well, as a little kid, were Robin Williams and Jim Carrey. Like, I'm not saying I agree with everything they've ever said and done, you know, they're not angels, but... And Robin Williams especially, he was a huge saving grace for me as a kid. Especially in the film Flubber, I can remember his character, I really identified with his character in Flubber, when I was like, you know, however old I was when it came out, five or something. And he like, kind of made it okay to be the way that I was. And I mean, actors wise, people like... Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, Tom Hanks, things that they said about acting. Like I quoted Jim Carrey earlier, that you can sort of equate to any sort of art form. You know, I think they're amazing. And David Lynch, I mean, legend. Some questionable photography, but everything else I love and approve. But yeah, photography wise, I'm embarrassed. Some people, some of my teachers that I talked about before who really, really did. I don't know if I would have told them, they really did save my life like quite literally and that was like McWilliamson, Susan Andrews, some amazing Heather McDonagh, Rod Morris, like there were some really, Anya Dombrowska another one, you know really amazing people that I super needed at that point in my life. It kind of links to representation you were talking about as well because I think One of the things that struck me when I went to university, me and my friend Richard were like literally the only northerners in Hall of Fine Art and Photography and we were kind of like what's going on? Do you know what I mean? Like yeah and it's and it was really clearly obvious who came from working class backgrounds and who didn't, you know, by camera equipment, you know, the kind of frames they could get for their exhibitions, the kind of, you know, and Richard was from Huddersfield actually just up... up the road from Leeds and weirdly we knew some of the same people which was quite odd. But yeah and I, two of my biggest influences, probably gonna kill me for saying this but when I was kind of in like my year two of my BA this photographer walked in to do alternative print workshops with us called David George who's from Stotson on Tees. I think he's from Stotson on Tees. But he walked in a pair of boots and turn up jeans and a Harrington jacket with a Northern accent and I went, oh my god. Like this guy, as soon as he opened his mouth, I was like, this is crazy because everybody sounds posh to me in London and my accent sounds really common, like I think it stands out. And also I started to dress a certain way at uni. I started to like not wear Harrington jackets and not... not wear Doc Martens and kind of think to be taken seriously. I had to dress really quote unquote smartly you know and when David walked in and he was this northerner with this incredible photography work who'd exhibited in galleries and done all this amazing stuff and he co-founded in certain states and all these things and I was like oh my god a northerner who's killing it basically and another person who's going to kill me as well. Sorry David if you're listening. The other person who's going to kill me is Laura Noble. So when we were on BA, our head of department, Mick was very good at making us go to exhibitions and saying you should check this out and you should check that out and you should do this and one of the things I did was go to as much as I could to meet as many people as I could to also stalk my favourite photographers as well. Like one of the people who was at everything I went to was Laura Noble who's the director of the... LA Nobel Gallery and she was at everything and obviously she does Fix Photo Festival as well which I've been to and she was this gallery director with a huge fairy coat on which I have loads of those you know she had this fantastic makeup on big hair, big personality, big everything from Manchester and I was like oh my god it was like it was you know that was the other thing I was like Oh my god, she's from Manchester and look at this. I can remember being at the Baird House exhibition that she did that was for, yeah, for Fix Photo Festival, I think, thinking, oh my god, she comes from Manchester and she can do this. It was really weird. It's... And it was funny because the only other time I've ever heard anyone say this, there was this... Sorry to talk about this trashy program, but on The Apprentice one year, a girl won it who actually went to my high school. After me, she was younger than me, but I didn't know her. But in the dreaded interviews that they have near to the end of the series, she got chatting to one of the interviewers who I think might actually be from Leeds. I can't remember, is it Linda? But yeah, this girl who actually went on to win it, she broke down and said she wanted to make something of herself because everyone said, nobody leaves. Garfoth. I can't remember if she said nobody leaves Garfoth or nobody leaves Leeds and Garfoth is the town I grew up in so that's my high school and she was really determined to make something of herself and people had told her that she'd never do it because of where she was from. So that's the only time and I feel really bad because I didn't back her as a winner. But she did go on to win it and that was one of the big things, you know, I was glad it wasn't just me who felt like that, but it was Yeah, David and Laura that I kind of first saw and went, oh my god, maybe I've got a chance, you know. That gave me a hell of a lot of confidence. But yeah, so that's kind of my influences, I guess. Yeah, there's a lot of musical ones but I won't bore you with the, you know, the details. But just as you're talking, you know, and that's kind of a theme that comes up a bit, you know, being able to see yourself actually, if they can do it, if that person can do it, then I can as well. But also, I mean, I know you well enough through London Independent Photography and you're on the committee for that doing, can't remember all that you do, but certainly doing the regular kind of talks that London Independent Photography does. I know you do a whole lot of curating, you do your photography, and you just seem to have so many things on. You know, I think everybody has that self doubt, not everybody, but I think a lot of people have that self doubt, you know, particularly artists, you know, it's kind of like, am I good enough or can I do this? But I'm looking at you thinking, God, you're kind of like, you're curating shows at, you know, pretty good galleries. You're doing kind of stuff for London Independent Photography, and I'm sure there's whole slew of stuff that I don't know about. Do you want to talk a little bit about that briefly? Because it just seems like you have so much that you're involved with. I'll come back to that. One of the things I've just sort of listened to you talk was that you said about seeing other people and I just had a brainwave just now when you were talking about influences and then you were just saying about seeing other people and thinking oh I can do that. The phrase imposter syndrome gets used so frequently by people in the arts, so frequently. And when I was on my third year of my BA I learnt a really valuable lesson. We had Steve McLeod from Metro Imaging come in and he was gonna look around all our graduation work and then pick one of us to mentor. And we all got feedback, we all met up in studios afterwards and he gave us feedback to our faces and in front of all our peers and everything and our teachers. And Steve went round and gave everybody feedback and said, you know, this is nice and it was all lovely. When it got to me, Now the graduation work that I did, I had tiny, tiny photo montage, dark room prints that had taken me months to make. I'd had to use tweezers. They were tiny dark room prints and they were in glass bottles with something that was special like formaldehyde and they were, you know, find this on my Instagram highlights and they were presented on a shelf. And the other piece was a butterfly box that was my Nana's and she collected ethically by the way and I had some more of these montages like pinned into this butterfly box and he turned to me in front of everybody and said to me oh I don't think you're a photographer I think you're a fine artist and I was absolutely livid with my feedback I think because everybody else got really constructive feedback and I didn't I got that and one even one of my teachers Sue said I really disagree with him about that she wasn't best pleased but that what i was gonna say was it did give me this really bad kind of self-doubt like imposter syndrome like so do i have to work a certain way and this is why i get cross art i mean they can sue me if they want but i get cross at the royal photographic society and i'm really sorry if anybody listening is a fellow or whatever the next level's up or whatever they are members of rps or whatever but i will never ever pay anybody to tell me that I am good enough a photographer to be in their club. Like, I will never do that. Like, I had a look online not long ago and I think you have to pay, I think the second stage is like a hundred and something pounds. And I just thought, I think that, I feel like that is very predatory because I feel like there will be a lot of people out there with self-doubt about themselves, about the level of photographer they are, that will then pay that money for some people at the RPS who they don't even know. to say whether their work is good enough, you can be in our club or not. And can you imagine the amount of people that they say no to? Or like you get into the first stage and you don't get into the second stage and people will really try really, really hard. Art is subjective. You can't judge it like that. If you could, you'd get into every single open call you entered, but it's not. And it's not because you're not good enough, it's because your work didn't speak to that person. You know? And that just came up in my head. When we were talking about, yeah, that kind of representation is important, but that's just something that really winds me up as somebody who's had a, I've spent a long time going, am I good enough? I just think that, you know, self belief is absolutely paramount. Like that's the main thing. No, I agree with you. That's a really good point to make. And that's one thing that I've struggled with as well in terms of, you know, what's good, what's not. And it's, it is so subjective. But maybe briefly just talk a little bit about some of the projects you've done or you're working on. So photographic projects wise, I've got an ongoing project called Healing from a Narcissist, which I have no idea how long that project is going to take. There's about five stages so far. It could end up being 10 or 100. I don't know how many years that's going to go on for. And that's kind of a raising awareness of narcissistic personality syndrome. and narcissistic victim syndrome which are the form of PTSD which is quite challenging and it kind of chronicles the recovery from narcissistic abuse which I kind of describe that as an internal civil war to be honest. But yeah and then the other kind of a bit more light-hearted thing, I'm doing a project about from the Riverleigh source until to Hackney Marsh and to Ends which is a bit of a... landscape project. Doing a bit of work with Laura Noble. She's going to be curating at Photo London which is going to be fantastic. It's going to be good to be back with Laura because I used to intern with her before I was friends with her and we worked on Photo 50 in 2019 at London Art Fair so it'll be good to be back with Laura and some familiar faces so that's exciting. Carrying on with the London Independent Photography Talks. We've launched an industry experts panel, which features Laura Noble herself, Zelda Cheadle, Anya Dombosco and Susan Andrews, who are all going to be offering portfolio reviews, work development, mentoring, anything you can think of at a really discounted price for LIP members only. So that's a real sort of privilege to have those four on the schedules that they're on. So if you're interested in that, you can look up the LIP website. I'll be curating the show in Southend in June, which will be at the Little Known Studio, which is run by a painter called Andy Downs. And I've been invited to curate a show there and I'm taking the fabulous TOW Collective with me, which was founded by Adam Lucy. And I'll be putting their work into Andy's gallery, which is fantastic because he's not based in London. we are and it's going to be a nice way to get in front of a new audience and get him to know some new artists that he doesn't know. Yeah, so definitely look up Little Known Studio, it's absolutely gorgeous. And the other thing that I will be doing is I'll be curating a show called Silent Voice at the Nehru Centre in Meherfair, which is the cultural wing of the High Commission of India in the UK. And that's worked by Buntri Chandariya. who's an absolutely wonderful photographer, which that'll be raising money for Alzheimer's UK. So that'll be really fantastic show. It's a real privilege to kind of be asked, invited to do it, you know, kind of on reputation, which is nice. Other than that, sorting out my website. And yeah, kind of hoping a gallery will take a punt on giving me a job would be the other thing. But yeah, that's kind of what I've got going on at the moment. Well great, it sounds like you have quite a lot on and some very different and diverse things that you're working on. So thank you, it's been wonderful chatting with you and it's been so interesting to hear about your art and your journey. Yeah, thanks Heather. It was really good to be invited and I think it's a really amazing series and I can't wait to hear some more of them. Thank you so much Heather. Thank you. Thanks for listening to this episode with Jenny. I hope you enjoyed it. More information about Jenny, as well as the podcast, are in the podcast notes. If you're able to, please rate and review the podcast in the podcast apps. In the final episode of this series, I speak with Anisa Duruji, who is a sports and portrait photographer and also an art director and is based in London, England. Here's a clip of her conversation. I think for me, I just want to capture a real and raw essence of anyone who comes and sits in front of me. I got told once that you should pose females in a certain way and they should look more feminine. Well, I'm not that kind of girl, so I wouldn't like it if someone... So I kind of decided to create images that were more representative of the type of women I shoot. I try not to edit at all, if where possible. So they are just raw images converted to black and white or remaining in colour and I keep it as real as I can because then it's a better representation of the subject. I look forward to you joining me in the final episode with Anissa.