In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats to designer and educator Brian Paul Lamotte about  reimagining the possibilities of form, production and distribution in art and photobooks. In a deep dive into the book making process we open up a conversation about the changing scope of publishing, the transformative experience of being entangled with an artist and their intentions and ultimately design as a form of collaboration. Brian Paul Lamotte (b. 1984, San Francisco, USA) is an independent graphic designer & publisher specializing in art and photography books. Educated in graphic design at London’s Central St. Martins, he established his creative practice in New York and is currently based between Milano and Zürich. His design approach utilizes extensive visual and production research paired with image-led solutions and minimal typography. His publishing practice is driven by exploration and experimentation with the book form, production methods and models of distribution. He has designed and produced various books and projects for select publishers and clients including Aperture Foundation, Dashwood Books, Edition Patrick Frey, Fondation Louis Vuitton, GOST Books, Hauser & Wirth Publishers, Images Vevey, Ithaca Image Text Press, Jiazazhi, MAST Foundation, Meta/Books, MoMA, Pro Helvetia, Rizzoli,SPBH Editions and Twin Palms Publishers.Follow Brian on Instagram @brianpaullamotte Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Nathaniel Tonelli, known by their monika Female Pentimento, has cultivated a vast audience on social media in awe of their celestial images which both advocate for climate awareness while traversing the space between heaven and earth, life and death, spirituality and science fiction. While Nathaniel’s work feels provocative and exciting, it’s their approach to designing a practice that prioritizes care, independence and anonymity that I wanted to dig into with them during this episode. Together we talk about crafting a creative practice, affirmations, independence and the importance of finding a methodology that works for the individual. You can order Nathaniel’s photobook Inner Nature here published by Broccoli Press.Nathaniel Tonelli is an artist and art director whose work bridges photography with speculative storytelling, exploring themes of mysticism, deep ecology, and humanity’s imprint on nature. Through these lenses, Nathaniel considers the interwoven futures of our ecosystems and spiritual lives. Rooted in vibrant experimentation, their work is guided by gratitude, reverence, and mindfulness.Follow Nathaniel on Instagram @Female Pentimento Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE rate and review on Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher welcomes back Charlie Engman to talk about Cursed, his new book of AI Images. Cursed stands as a testament to Charlie’s visionary role in the rapidly evolving and highly contentious field of AI, offering an immersive exploration of uncharted artistic territories and proposing a new paradigm for the future and possibilities of photography. During their roving conversation, AI Images act as a way to not just reflect upon Charlie’s work but also to interrogate the discourse around value, provenance, creativity and economics as well as other pressing issues which get very little attention. Charlie Engman is a Brooklyn-based photographer, director, and art director whose work pushes the limits of traditional image making, simultaneously principled and irreverent — imbued with both the weird and wonderful. He has exhibited work globally and made four books. His work has been featured across AnOther Magazine, Dazed, Garage, POP, and T: The New York Times Style Magazine, among other publications. His commercial clients include Prada, Marni, Adidas, Hermès, Kenzo, Nike, Vivienne Westwood, and Stella McCartney. Charlie has also worked as Art Director at Collina Strada since 2019 — continuously pushing the creative & conceptual boundaries of the contemporary, sustainable brand.You can order Cursed  and Hello Chaos, a love story over at Mack. Follow Charlie on Instagram @charlieengman Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE rate and review on Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher talks to curator Alona Pardo about her rich practice rooted in multiplicity. Alona is one of those curators who knows how to truly capture the imagination of the audience, planting ideas in our minds that reverberate long after we have left her exhibitions. During the conversation, Alona talks about her process, interests and how her curatorial practice has evolved over time. Alona Pardo is Head of Programmes at the Arts Council Collection, UK, and was until recently a curator at Barbican Art Gallery in London for 15 years. With a focus on photography and film, she has curated numerous exhibitions including most recently RE/SISTERS: A Lens on Gender and Ecology (2023); Noemie Goudal: Phoenix (2022) as part of Les Rencontres de la Photographie, Arles; Masculinities: Liberation through Photography (2020); Trevor Paglen: From Apple to Anomaly (2019); Dorothea Lange: Politics of Seeing (2018); Vanessa Winship: And Time Folds (2018); Another Kind of Life: Photography on the Margins (2018); Richard Mosse: Incoming (2017) and Strange and Familiar: Britain as seen by International Photographers (with Martin Parr; 2016). She has a particular interest in work that operates at the intersection of gender, social and environmental justice.Follow Alona on Instagram @alona_pardo Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE rate and review on Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher delves into the unique approach of London-based photographic artist, Laura Pannack. Her practice, which is a blend of experimentation and research, is a deep exploration of the intricate relationship between subject and photographer. The work is rooted in intimate collaborations with individuals and communities, and it constantly pushes the boundaries of what photography can be. Laura Pannack, a London-based photographic artist, has made a significant impact in the field of portraiture and social documentary. Her work has been widely exhibited in prestigious institutions, including The National Portrait Gallery, Somerset House, The Houses of Parliament and the Royal Festival Hall. Her numerous awards, including the World Press Photo Award and the Julia Cameron Award, are a testament to the profound influence of her work. Last year, she published 'Youth Without Age and Life Without Death, with Guest Editions, a response to her need to escape and find adventure in the face of the relentless passage of time.Her artwork has received much acclaim and won numerous awards, including the John Kobal Award, Vic Odden Prize, World Photo Press Awards, Juliet Margaret Cameron Award, and the HSBC Prix de la Photographie prize.Follow Laura on Instagram @laurapannack. Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE rate and review it on the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher talks to Jermaine Francis about his multifaceted practice. Jermaine’s work is both deeply personal while also speaking to the intersection of politics and culture in the UK, inviting us to explore the physical and psychological aspects of our space, unpacking themes of history, power, class and race in photography. Jermaine Francis is a London lens Based Artist, his practice works within, Documentary & Portraiture, archive in the format of personal driven Photo projects & Editorials, exploring the issues that arise from our interaction in the everyday environment. He has published two books, Something that seems so Familiar in 2020 & 2021 Rhythms from the Metroplex, & is currently working on a new book with publishers Here Press. The International Centre of Photography NYC, The National Portrait Gallery, Galeriepcp Paris, Hetton Lawn Haus Wien, Vienna Austria 2021,Pembroke JCR galley Oxford, Saatchi Gallery, Centre of British Photography, a nominee for the 2024 Paul Huf foam Award, Awarded the Lightworks /Autograph 2024 Residency, and Cora Oxford Brookes 2024 Residency.Follow Jermaine on Instagram @jermainefrancisstudio Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE rate and review on Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to one of five special episodes recorded live at Peckham 24. In this episode, I speak to Eleonora Agostini about her series, A Study On Waitressing, in which she assembles and re-presents photographs, archival imagery and footage, collage and text as a research method to analyse the theatricality of the everyday and the function of the body as a conduit between observer and observed. Peckham 24 exists to support the photographic community by providing artists with opportunities to exhibit, share and discuss new work - shining a spotlight on cutting-edge contemporary photography.The theme for the 8th edition of the festival was Back to the future, bringing together artists who take moments from the past as inspiration to re-stage, re-imagine or re-think existing narratives. Eleonora is an Italian artist based in London. Her practice shifts between photography, moving image, performance and sculpture, exploring and analysing the difficulties of how human experience is constructed.Her research is strongly connected with the experience of our surroundings and she is interested in finding a possible fracture within our socially constructed rules and the spaces we inhabit. Eleonora refers to the every-day as a space full of potential and possibilities for quests, incorporating ordinary objects and activities within her images to express and navigate its different layers and meanings.Follow Eleonora @eleonoraagostini and  Peckham 24 @peckham24photo and Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected]  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to one of five special episodes recorded live at Peckham 24. In this episode, I talk to Bindi Vora about the two projects she presented at Peckham 24, Mountain of Salt and Unravelling which both employ the use of found or archival images. During our conversation we talk about how the absence of images shapes our lives, what it means to work with archival material, the artist as detective, deciphering traces and threads and connecting stories together. How collage can offer something important that language can't reach and the importance of imagining new language to talk about art making. Peckham 24 exists to support the photographic community by providing artists with opportunities to exhibit, share and discuss new work - shining a spotlight on cutting-edge contemporary photography.The theme for the 8th edition of the festival was Back to the future, bringing together artists who take moments from the past as inspiration to re-stage, re-imagine or re-think existing narratives. Bindi Vora is an interdisciplinary artist of Kenyan-Indian heritage, associate lecturer at LCC and senior curator at Autograph, London. She is interested in how ideas of resistance and resilience are shaped by our surroundings, histories and lived experiences. Her practice often combines linguistics and an archive of personal and found photographs procured over the last decade to draw on the intersections between language, culture and their inherent power dynamics.Follow Bindi @bindi_vora & Peckham 24 @peckham24photo & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to one of five special episodes recorded live at Peckham 24. In this episode, I talk to Lina Geoushy about her work Trailblazers, an inquiry into Egypt’s feminist history using self-portraiture, performance, and archival artifacts to reclaim and inscribe a counter-history. Responding to this dissonance in Egypts past and present, Lina has built an archive informed by a feminist impulse, amassing material from popular cultural material and combining that with performative self-portraiture that depicts trailblazing Egyptian feminists in the fields like art, science, law, activism and the military. Peckham 24 exists to support the photographic community by providing artists with opportunities to exhibit, share and discuss new work - shining a spotlight on cutting-edge contemporary photography.The theme for the 8th edition of the festival was Back to the future, bringing together artists who take moments from the past as inspiration to re-stage, re-imagine or re-think existing narratives. Lina Geoushy is a photographer and visual artist working across the spectrum of social documentary and portrait photography. She aims to tell stories that deconstruct and question the public's perception of the prevailing power of patriarchy. Her practice is research-led and her projects are both commissioned and self initiated. Her work largely explores gender politics and women empowerment issues. Follow Lina @linageoushy & Peckham 24 @peckham24photo & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected]  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to one of five special episodes recorded live at Peckham 24. In this episode, we celebrate and unpack Åsa Johannesson book Queer Methodology for Photography, diving into her research into new approaches for making, thinking about writing about Queer photography. Through the book, Åsa proposes a new concept of the photographic image that focuses on materiality, voicing concerns beyond representation. Peckham 24 exists to support the photographic community by providing artists with opportunities to exhibit, share and discuss new work - shining a spotlight on cutting-edge contemporary photography.The theme for the 8th edition of the festival was Back to the future, bringing together artists who take moments from the past as inspiration to re-stage, re-imagine or re-think existing narratives. Åsa Johannesson is an artist working across photography, installation, and writing. Her practice concerns the relationship between queerness, representation, and material knowledge production. She has exhibited her work internationally, including at Centrum för fotografi (Stockholm), Queer Britain (London), Landskrona Foto (Landskrona), Dyson Gallery (London) and FutureLab (Shanghai). Åsa’s work has been written about in the books Photography: A Queer History and Museums, Sexuality, and Gender Activism, and the journals Philosophy of Photography, British Journal of Photography, Yes & No, and Zine. She is based in London, UK and her hometown Växjö, Sweden. Follow Asa @asajohannes Peckham 24 @peckham24photo & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to one of five special episodes recorded live at Peckham 24. In this episode, I talk to Alexander Coggin about ‘Mike,’ a fifteen year photographic archive he made about his spouse Micheal. United by a spontaneity and informed by their background in theatre, Mike is a deeply intimate, yet playful exploration of Queer love told through over 300 photographs. Through ‘Mike,’ Alex offers a cross section of a lived history that encompasses the theatricality of the everyday to life's most vulnerable moments.Peckham 24 exists to support the photographic community by providing artists with opportunities to exhibit, share and discuss new work - shining a spotlight on cutting-edge contemporary photography.The theme for the 8th edition of the festival was Back to the future, bringing together artists who take moments from the past as inspiration to re-stage, re-imagine or re-think existing narratives. Alexander Coggin is an American queer photographer and filmmaker living in London who penetrates trends of visual homogeneity with idiosyncratic and uncanny imagery. Raised in the theatre, he is dedicated to bringing the same theatrical and artificial frameworks learned on the stage to the visible everyday. Follow Alexander @alexandercoggin & Peckham 24 @peckham24photo & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher talks to Ashleigh Kane taking a peek behind the curtain into the life of an editor and writer. Together we talk about the role of writers within the creative ecosystem, how our relationships with artists start and develop over time, and what it takes to sustain a career in writing. Ashleigh Kane is a writer, editor, creative consultant, art buyer, host, and curator based in London, UK.She is the Arts & Photography Editor-at-Large at Dazed & Confused and previously held the title of Arts & Culture editor from 2014-2020. Ashleigh is also an art buyer and curator for Thursday’s Child and she hosts Art After Hours in collaboration with the EDITION London, a series of monthly art tours that she curates and leads. She’s written for Dazed, i-D, AnOther, The Face, ELEPHANT, HighSnobiety, Crack, Brick, Riposte, foam, Glorious sport, Truth, and AMBUSH universe.Follow Ashleigh on Instagram @ashleighkane  Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher is in conversation with Photo Editor Emily Keegin about New Rules, a special collaboration with WePresent, the arts platform from WeTransfer. If you're not aware of them, WePresent is a platform that spotlights creatives from around the world and collaborates with artists on one-off special projects. Gem was invited by WePresent to edit New Rules, a guide about photography that speaks to our current moment, and through candid conversations, attempts to explore photography’s unfixed future.New Rules is a group portrait by photographers, curators and editors, many of whom stepped away from the traditional trajectory to embrace an alternative path. They have crafted new strategies, held space for marginalised voices and built new infrastructure, modes of making and blueprints for communing. None of this was easy, but for many of these artists, it was riskier to stay still than not make a change. New Rules includes insights from Charlie Engman, Antwaun Sargent, Sheida Solemani, Quil Lemons, Myriam Boulos, Rhiannon Adam, Elisa Medde and Eve Lyons to name just a few.  It also features Fuck, Marry, Kill Photography, an essay by Emily Keegin about what it means to have a career in photography.Download New Rules here. Follow Emily Keegin @emily_elsie WePresent @wepresent and Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher talks to Carmen Winant about her latest book The Last Safe Abortion. Focusing on the near-fifty-year period in which abortion was legal in the United States (1973–2022), the project  recognises the care, advocacy, and community-building of abortion workers. The photographs themselves are surprisingly regular: women answer the phone, sterilize medical equipment, throw staff birthday parties, offer workshops and schedule appointments. In centering the tender, quotidian, and routine acts that inform this healthcare work, Carmen works to counter the ways anti-choice activists have weaponised photography by proposing a visuality that attends to abortion care. We unpack the evolution of the project and everything it entailed.Carmen Winant is an artist and the Roy Lichtenstein Chair of Studio Art at the Ohio State University. Her work utilizes archival and authored photographs to examine feminist care networks, with particular emphasis on intergenerational, multiracial, and sometimes transnational coalition building. Winant's recent projects have been shown at the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Minneapolis Institute of Art, Sculpture Center, Wexner Center of the Arts, ICA Boston, the Cleveland Museum of Art, and el Museo Universitario Arte Contemporáneo. Winant's artist’s books include My Birth (2018), Notes on Fundamental Joy (2019), and Instructional Photography: Learning How To Live Now (2021); Arrangements, A Brand New End: Survival and Its Pictures (both 2022), and The last safe abortion (2024). Winant is a 2019 Guggenheim Fellow in photography, a 2020 FCA Artist Honoree and a 2021 American Academy of Arts and Letters award recipient. She is also a community organizer, prison educator, and mother to her two children, Carlo and Rafa, shared with her partner, Luke Stettner.If you can, you can support the following orgainsations Carmen mentioned during our conversation:National network of abortion funds https://trustwomen.org/donate/https://feministcenter.org/donate/https://www.preterm.org/monthlyhttps://www.emmagoldman.com/help-out.htmlFollow Carmen  on Instagram @carmen.winant Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats to The Museum of Modern Art Photography Curator Roxana Marcoci. Using some of Roxana’s recent and upcoming exhibitions as jump off points, we explore everything from the ethical responsibility of curatorial practice to the evolving relationship between humans and technology. Roxanna talks about who inspires her, how her approach is guided by deep relationships and informed risk, and her rallying cry to all of us to be bolder in our artistic endeavours.  Roxana Marcoci is the David Dechman Senior Curator and Acting Chief Curator of Photography at The Museum of Modern Art. She holds a PhD in art history, theory, and criticism from the Institute of Fine Arts at New York University. She is a recipient of the 2011 Center for Curatorial Leadership Fellowship. Marcoci has chaired the Central and Eastern European group (2013-2023) and is currently the inaugural Chair of the West Asia group of MoMA’s Contemporary and Modern Art Perspectives (C-MAP) program. In 2010 Marcoci co-founded MoMA’s Forums on Contemporary Photography, an experimental platform for free-form critical discussions about the perspectives and scope of image-making among artists, curators, and cultural theorists. Her research engages transnational and diasporic histories of feminist art and new models of solidarity. Marcoci has published over 50 essays on modern and contemporary art and co-authored the three-volume Photography at MoMA (2015/17).Marcoci has curated numerous exhibitions, including LaToya Ruby Frazier: Monuments of Solidarity (2024); An-My Lê, Between Two Rivers/Giữa hai giòng sông/Entre deux rivières (2023); Wolfgang Tillmans: To look without fear (2022), which traveled to the Art Gallery ofOntario (2023) and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (2024); Our Selves: Photographs by Women Artists from Helen Kornblum (2022); Carrie Mae Weems: From Here I Saw What Happened and I Cried (2020); Louise Lawler: WHY PICTURES NOW (2017); Zoe Leonard:Analogue (2015); From Bauhaus to Buenos Aires: Grete Stern and Horacio Coppola (2015); Christopher Williams: The Production Line of Happiness (2014); The Shaping of New Visions: Photography, Film, Photobook (2012); Taryn Simon: A Living Man Declared Dead and Other Chapters I–XVIII (2012); Sanja Iveković: Sweet Violence (2011); Staging Action:Performance in Photography Since 1960 (2011); Pictures by Women: A History of Modern Photography (2010); and The Original Copy: Photography of Sculpture, 1839 to Today (2010).Follow Roxana on Instagram @roxanamarcoci Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats to the curator and writer Lou Stoppard about Exteriors, her new exhibition at MEP Paris and a book of the same title published by MACK. The project takes the writing from Annie Ernaux’s Exteriors where Annie endeavoured to ‘describe reality through the eyes of a photographer.” Lou takes this work and asks the question Can you see a text? Can you read a photograph? And pairs Annie’s texts with images from the MEP’s collection to offer viewers a provocation on how to  see the world anew.  In this conversation, we discuss Lou’s approach to exhibition making, her collaboration with Annie, how she thinks about audience and much more. Lou has written for The Financial Times, Aperture, The New York Times and The New Yorker. Her books include a survey of the work of street photographer Shirley Baker, published by Mack in 2019, 'Pools', an exploration of swimming in photography, published by Rizzoli in 2020, and Exteriors: Annie Ernaux and Photography, published by Mack in 2024, to time with an exhibition of the same name at MEP, Paris.Follow Lou on Instagram @loustoppard Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In today's minisode, Gem Fletcher speaks to Brea Souders about her latest book Another Online Pervert, which charts her multi-year conversation with a female-programmed chatbot. The book published by Mack, combines excerpts from their conversation with images from her archive. It is highly charged, jumping between the playful and mundane to the dark and ruthless as she unpacks the complex relationship between humans and machines in a provocative publication that invites us to think about the future of our own humanity. The TMT minisodes are short, focused conversations with photographers on books, exhibitions, and special projects, focusing on not just how these endeavours came into being but also what they bring out in us in terms of growth and reflection.Follow Brea on Instagram.  Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, please leave a review. It really helps like minded people find the podcast. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this minisode, Gem Fletcher speaks to previous guest Micaiah Carter about his first monograph, What’s My Name. The book, published by Prestel, charts over a decade of Micaiah's work interlaced with images from his parent's archives dating back to the 1960s. His work, often celebratory in tone, is a true care practice for everyone he collaborates with. We dig into the emotional labour of making a book, what he discovered about himself and what he had to overcome to put himself out there to create a new American dream. The TMT minisodes are short, focused conversations with photographers on books, exhibitions, and special projects, focusing on not just how these endeavours came into being but also what they bring out in us in terms of growth and reflection.Follow Micaiah on Instagram. Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, please leave a review. It really helps like minded people find the podcast. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Gem Fletcher chats to Rene Matić about a moment of flux in their practice. They are looking differently at the world, their work and the relationships they hold close. There is a change of pace, intention and visual language brewing for the artist who has literally not stopped making since they picked up a camera five years ago. In the episode, they talk about their first solo show, Kiss them from me, at Chapter NY. They also dig into friendship, love, being with each other, tiredness, optimism, nationalism and patriotism and above all rudeness, which is a guiding principle of their practice. Rene Matić (b. 1997, Peterborough, UK) is a London-based artist and writer whose practice spans across photography, film, and sculpture, converging in a meeting place they describe as "rude(ness)" - an evidencing and honouring of the in-between. Matić draws inspiration from dance and music movements such as Northern soul, Ska, and 2-Tone as a tool to delve into the complex relationship between West Indian and white working-class culture in Britain, whilst privileging queer/ing intimacies, partnerships and pleasure as modes of survival. Follow Rene on Instagram. Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode please leave a review. It really helps like-minded people find the podcast. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth, we will be back very soon.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Andi Galdi Vinko is an internationally acclaimed artist working in photography. Her work draws visual analogies between intensely personal and intimate experiences of motherhood and womanhood and universal human experiences of coming of age, ageing, loss, and the conflict between Western and Eastern European ideologies. In this episode, we talk about her award-winning book, Sorry I Gave Birth I Disappeared But Now I’m Back and everything that went into the project. We also talk about survival strategies and the experience of being a working parent and artist. Andi has been commissioned and published in magazines such as the FT Weekend, Apollo Magazine, Wallpaper, The Guardian, The Observer, Zeit Magazine, Volkstrant Magazine, M Le Monde, Die Zeit, El Pais, i-D, Dazed, Vice, The New Yorker, Tate etc, among others. Her recently published book (Sorry I Gave Birth I Disappeared But Now I’m Back, Trolleybooks, London) was launched at Unseen Amsterdam, at Paris Photo at Ruptures Associes, at TJ Boulting Gallery in London, and Bildband in Berlin with Felix Hoffman. She also won the 2023 Kraszna Krausz Book Award. Follow Andi @andigaldi & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Iranian-American photographer Sinna Nasseri describes his ability to catapult viewers into every scene he captures as a "gonzo journalism curiosity." He brings the audience along with him, always thinking about what they want to see. As a self-taught photographer, the path was in no way easy, and he continues to craft a life that enables him to work but with the necessary sacrifices. In a surprising turn of events, 2020 became the year that put Sinna on the map. On the show, we talk about the highs and lows of building a career in the photo industry, what makes a good photo, the pressure and discomfort that comes with figuring out your style and a rhythm of working, while also understanding the conditions in which you do your best work.The photographer has spent the last three years working on assignments for The New York Times, Vogue, GQ, Departures, The Sunday Times and Interview Magazine and collaborating with clients like Thom Browne. He lives and works in LA.Follow Sinna @strange.victory & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Since the 1990s, Vinca Petersen's work has remained an authentic voice of European counterculture, providing diaristic windows onto alternative spaces and lifestyles. A multidisciplinary artist who works in the area of social practice, Petersen's works emerge from a deep social and political engagement with underrepresented communities, giving them a voice and recognition. Her photographic oeuvre captures a period spanning 1990-2004, documenting the artist’s experiences as part of the free party and traveller community. The images juxtapose the sense of escapism and euphoria of this unique cultural moment with the oppressive political climate which outlawed the lifestyles of those responsible for Britain’s rave scene. As well as archiving thousands of photographic images, Petersen has attempted to document a way of life: its flyers, posters and clothes; her work constitutes an archive that records the techno-fuelled raves and lives of the travellers who organised them, but also a creative response to breaking barriers between individuals. Vinca Petersen’s (b.1973) recent solo exhibitions include Make Social Honey - A Collective Search for Joy, Northern Gallery of Contemporary Art, Sunderland, UK (2022); Raves and Riots, Edel Assanti, London, UK. Selected group exhibitions include Techno Worlds, Goethe-Institut, Los Angeles, USA (2022); Sweet Harmony: Out of the Underground, HetHEM, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (2022); It’s a Rave Dave, Giant Gallery, Bournemouth, UK (2021); Night Fever: Designing Club Culture, V&A Dundee, Dundee, UK (2021); Rave, Saatchi Gallery, London, UK (2019); Seaside Photographed, Turner Contemporary, Margate, UK (2019); Diaristic Books, Turner Contemporary, London, UK (2019). Her work is in several public collections including The Arts Council Collection, London, UK; National Portrait Gallery, London, UK; The Monsoon Collection, London, UK; Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK. Vinca Petersen (b. 1973) lives on the Isle of Skye. You can support Vinca's work here: https://www.patreon.com/VincaPetersenFollow Vinca @vincapetersen & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Balarama Heller's practice reimagines archetypal symbols found in the natural world. He explores primal symbols and patterns, both real and imagined, working towards a visual language of preverbal awareness. These symbols interact in a ceaseless cycle of creation and destruction, referencing the cosmological, mythological, and atomic scales. During our conversation, we talk about how his personal history informs his work, his research practice and how he is shifting away from direct observation to the most reduced and refined versions of his work. Balarama lives and works in New York City. Recent exhibitions include Sacred Place with Aperture Foundation / Artsy. Recent group shows include Maelstrom, at 303 Gallery,  New York, You Can't Win, Jack Black's America curated by Randy Kennedy at Fortnight Institute, What's Outside the Window at ReadingRoom, Melbourne AU, Agnes B New York, New Artists at Red Hook Labs and the 2015 Aperture Summer Open. In 2014, he published his first artist book, Into and Through. Zero at the Bone received 1st place for the 2017 Center Awards Editor’s Choice and runner-up for the 2017 Aperture Portfolio Prize. His 2019 project Sacred Place was featured in Aperture Magazine issue 241, with text by Pico Iyer. Follow Balarama @balaramaheller & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sheida Soleimani’s work explores intersections of art and activism. She melds sculpture, performance, film and photography to highlight critical perspectives on events across the Middle East, unpicking the complex power dynamics between the region and Western nations. Her work interrogates the dissemination of information in digital contexts, adapting found images from press and social media leaks to exist within alternative scenarios. In doing this, she’s rigorously interrogating the role of images in our lives and psychology, as well as the way they manifest as propaganda in geopolitics. During our conversation, we talk about process, practice, craft, care critique and the importance of spontaneity. Sheida Soleimani (b. 1990) received her MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art in 2015. Recent solo exhibitions include Ghostwriter, Edel Assanti, London, UK (2023); Negotiators, Kunsthaus Photoforum Pasquart, Biel, CH  (2022); Ghostwriter, Providence College Galleries, Providence, USA (2022); ILVA, Castello San Basilio, Basilicata, Italy (2022); Levers of Power, Silver Eye Centre for Photography, Pittsburgh, USA (2021); Hotbed, Denny Dimin Gallery, New York, USA (2020); Medium of Exchange, Southern Utah Museum of Art, Utah; CUE Art Foundation, New York; Cincinnati Contemporary Art, Cincinnati and Atlanta Contemporary, Atlanta, all USA (2018-2019). Selected group exhibitions include Rising Sun: Artists in an Uncertain AmericaA Trillion Sunsets, ICP, New York, USA (2022); Immune Project, Living Art Museum, Reykjavik, Iceland (2022); Denunciation!, ACC Gallery, Weimar, Germany (2021); deCordova Biennial, deCordova Museum of Art, Lincoln, USA (2019); Ecologies of Darkness, SAVVY Contemporary, Berlin, Germany (2019). Soleimani lives and works in Providence, Rhode Island.Follow Sheida @sheidajanam & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Alexandra Rose Howland's practice is invested in illustrating the difficult complexities of our existence. Through her work, she seeks to generate a more expansive understanding of how issues around conflict and the climate crisis are portrayed. She does this by resisting the historical notion of photography as a mode of direct representation created by a single author. Instead, she embraces image-making as a social practice, co-creating stories with her participants. Alexandra has lived in the Middle East over the last decade, creating work that aims to challenge and expand the ways that geopolitical events are communicated. Her background as an abstract painter informs her practice, resulting in multidimensional projects that use images, found objects, interviews and video. She has shown internationally with both solo and group exhibitions including Leave and Let Us Go (solo), FOAM Museum Amsterdam, Road to Mosul (solo), London, Textured to Only Us (solo), Los Angeles.  Leave and Let Us Go was published by GOST Books in 2021.Follow Alexandra @alexandrahowland & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Myriam Boulos’s practice is rooted in community and resistance, exploring the complex ways our bodies metabolise trauma, assert resistance, seek pleasure and express layers of identity. During our conversation, we talk about Myriam’s projects through the lens of intimacy, survival, political agency, resistance and revolution and perhaps most importantly, consent. Myriam Boulos was born in 1992 in Lebanon. At the age of 16 she started to use her camera to question Beirut, its people, and her place among them. She graduated with a master degree in photography from L’Académie Libanaise des Beaux Arts in 2015. Myriam took part in both national and international collective exhibitions, including “Infinite Identities” (Amsterdam), 3ème biennale des photographes du monde arabe (Paris), and “C’est Beyrouth” (Paris). Today she uses photography to explore, defy and resist society. In 2021 she was awarded the Grand prix ISEM and she joined Magnum. She is the Photo Director of Al Hayya Magazine and is currently working on her first book, What’s Ours, in collaboration with Aperture.Follow Myriam @myriamboulos & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Throughout her career, Photo Director Jacqueline Bates has harnessed the power of photography to give visual journalism new dimension. During our conversation, we talk about her new role at the New York Times Opinion section in which she’s publishing up to 90 stories a week. We discuss the blurring of art and editorial, how she works with emerging talent and we visit some of her most fascinating commissions. As you will hear throughout the episode, Jackie is deeply committed to her responsibility as a photo director, always in service of the story, while taking creative risks and expanding the notion of who can work editorially in meaningful ways. Prior to the NYT Opinion Section, Jacqueline was the founding photography director of The California Sunday Magazine, the Pulitzer Prize-winning print magazine, and “Pop-Up Magazine,” the acclaimed live-magazine show. Under her direction, California Sunday won the National Magazine Award for photography in 2016 and 2017, the first title in 25 years to win in consecutive years. Previously, she was the senior photo editor of W Magazine and worked in the photo departments of ELLE, Interview and Wired. She holds an MFA in photography from the School of Visual Arts, and teaches at Parsons School of Design.  Follow Jackie @jackiecbates & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher speaks to photographer and artist Rhiannon Adam. Her work is heavily influenced by her nomadic childhood spent at sea, sailing around the world with her parents. Little photographic evidence of this period in her life exists, igniting an interest in the influence of photography on recall, the notion of the photograph as a physical object, and the image as an intersection between fact and fiction – themes that continue throughout her work. In 2015, supported by the BBC/Royal Geographical Society, Adam travelled to the remote island community of Pitcairn in the South Pacific. Pitcairn measures just two miles by one mile and is home to just 42 British subjects, descendants from the Mutiny on the Bounty. A decade ago, the island’s romantic image was tarnished by a string of high profile sexual abuse trials. As a result, islanders are particularly reticent about accepting outsiders. With trip duration dictated by the quarterly supply vessel, there would be no way off for three arduous months. Adam’s project is the first in-depth photographic project to take place on the island, and made its debut at Francesca Maffeo Gallery in Spring 2018. The project won the Meitar Award for Excellence in Photography in 2020. The resulting book, Big Fence / Pitcairn Island (Blow Up Press), was formally released in April 2022 on the anniversary of the Bounty Mutiny and appeared in the final 10 titles selected for the Photography Book Award at the 2022 Kraszna Krausz Foundation book awards. In the show, we have a roving conversation about how projects unravel, creative intentions, working in discomfort, and the challenges of working within a broken system, VIA conversations about bookmaking, multifaceted careers, beauty, and going to space - which Rhiannon actually is doing with Space X and Dear Moon. But at the heart of it are some interesting ideas about what photography is and can do. You can find our more about Dear Moon and Rhiannons trip to space here.Follow Rhiannon @rhiannon_adam & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher speaks to London-based photographer Steph Wilson. For Steph, The body is such a vast universe of paradoxes that will never get old. Traversing the space between fine art and fashion, Steph cherishes humour and joy, while exploring the possibilities of our bodies. She is interested in the edges; the awkward, uncomfortable, ugly, shameful and challenging and takes these elements to assert new modes of beauty and being. Shooting commercial, editorial and personal work, her expansive practice has manifested into work for Gucci, Versace, Nike, Dazed & Confused and Vogue Italia. Follow Steph @stephwilsonshoots & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher speaks to London-based photographer Harley Weir. In this episode we discuss how her approach to image making is one rooted in alchemy - creating space for the unexpected. She fuses materials together that challenge each other, evoking an immediate and arresting world, familiar to us and filled with emotion, yet suggestive of a darker and more compulsive set of psychic and material forces. Beyond her limitless talent, what's captivating about Harley is her honesty - about her process, the industry and what her practice enables her to do. Harley is a London based widely-acclaimed fashion photographer whose work has been commissioned by brands like Balenciaga, Gucci, Isabel Marant, Marc Jacobs. She has published five books to date and exhibited in a number of institutions including Foam Amsterdam and MEP and Hannah Barry Gallery. What unites this work is a highly-attuned sense of colour and composition that disrupts notions of gaze, desire, sexuality and beauty while also speaking to a range of political and social issues including plastic waste, the rights of refugees and migrants, marine conservation. Her practice is nor interested in being one thing, instead it explores multiple avenues at any one time. Follow Harley @harleyweir & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Gem Fletcher speaks to artist Audrey Blue (nee Gillespie) in the final episode of a three-part series in partnership with Seen Fifteen Gallery. The Troubles Generation - an ongoing curatorial project by Vivienne Gamble invites artists who grew up in Northern Ireland during The Troubles to shed new light on the impact of being brought up in an era of intense sectarian violence.Audrey Blue is a fine artist from Derry, Northern Ireland. Currently based in Belfast, her media includes analogue photography, painting and printmaking. Blue’s themes explore queerness, mortality and conflict with youth and anxiety. This Hurts has been exhibited in Ireland at Photo Ireland Photography Festival (2022), Belfast Exposed Photography Gallery “Street View” (2022) and within the major group exhibition, Saturation, at Crawford Art Gallery, Cork. Audrey Blue is a selected artist for New Irish Works (Photo Ireland) and the European photography platform, FUTURES. Looking ahead to a significant future moment in UK and Irish history with the 25th anniversary of The Good Friday Agreement in 2023, The Troubles Generation project seeks to examine the legacy of The Troubles from the viewpoint of artists born into its divided society and with lived experience of growing up with conflict as the backdrop to their lives. Taking a phased approach to developing photographic projects and new writing, the ultimate ambition is to create a large-scale touring exhibition in 2023. The project's first phase at Seen Fifteen has been generously supported by the Genesis Kickstart Fund, enabling three solo exhibitions with Martin Seeds, Gareth McConnell and Audrey Blue. Seen Fifteen is an independent emerging gallery and project space in Peckham, South East London. Seen Fifteen’s artistic programme champions contemporary photography with a focus on emerging, diverse and experimental artists who expand the boundaries of the medium. Founded in 2015 by curator Vivienne Gamble, the gallery has hosted a number of widely acclaimed first UK solo shows for breakthrough photographic artists such as Laura El-Tantawy, Jan McCullough, Maya Rochat and Martin Seeds. Follow Audrey @artdrey__ Seen Fifteen @seenfifteen & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Gem Fletcher speaks to photographer Gareth McConnell in the second episode of a three-part series in partnership with Seen Fifteen Gallery. The Troubles Generation - an ongoing curatorial project by Vivienne Gamble invites artists who grew up in Northern Ireland during The Troubles to shed new light on the impact of being brought up in an era of intense sectarian violence. Gareth McConnell is a London-based photographer with diverse interests and many styles of approach. His work as a fine artist has been given recognition in monographs, cover features, and articles including from Steidl/Photoworks, Frieze, and Aperture. His fine art prints are widely collected. In the past, he has worked as a documentary photographer for the New York Times, and served high-end fashion – Vogue Homme, Pop, and AnOther, and clients like Dior, Gucci and Chloe. He has worked in the music industry with artists including Sia, Disclosure and Ivan Smagghe. McConnell has actively instigated non-commercial projects with other artists and writers, publishing them under his imprint Sorika, and has co-curated a show at London’s ICA, and talk events at the ICA and Tate Modern. McConnell has shown at many galleries and fairs, including Carl Freedman Gallery, Frieze Art Fair, Kasmin Gallery, the National Portrait Gallery, and the Photographers’ Gallery. He is represented in significant private and public collections. He increasingly values a direct relationship with audiences through his websites and social media platforms. Looking ahead to a significant future moment in UK and Irish history with the 25th anniversary of The Good Friday Agreement in 2023, The Troubles Generation project seeks to examine the legacy of The Troubles from the viewpoint of artists born into its divided society and with lived experience of growing up with conflict as the backdrop to their lives. Taking a phased approach to developing photographic projects and new writing, the ultimate ambition is to create a large-scale touring exhibition in 2023. The project's first phase at Seen Fifteen has been generously supported by the Genesis Kickstart Fund, enabling three solo exhibitions with Martin Seeds, Gareth McConnell and Audrey Blue. Seen Fifteen is an independent emerging gallery and project space in Peckham, South East London. Seen Fifteen’s artistic programme champions contemporary photography with a focus on emerging, diverse and experimental artists who expand the boundaries of the medium. Founded in 2015 by curator Vivienne Gamble, the gallery has hosted a number of widely acclaimed first UK solo shows for breakthrough photographic artists such as Laura El-Tantawy, Jan McCullough, Maya Rochat and Martin Seeds. Follow Gareth @garethwmcconnell Seen Fifteen @seenfifteen & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected]  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher speaks to photographer and educator Martin Seeds as part of a three-part series in partnership with Seen Fifteen Gallery. The Troubles Generation - an ongoing curatorial project by Vivienne Gamble invites artists who grew up in Northern Ireland during The Troubles to shed new light on the impact of being brought up in an era of intense sectarian violence. Originally from Belfast, Martin Seed’s practice is shaped by his relationship with his Northern Irish homeland. Personal narratives, the relationship to place, politics, conflict, sameness and difference, diaspora and myth are underlying themes that recur and interconnect in his work. He experiments with combinations of analogue and digital imaging technologies as a way to draw attention to the conflicting experiences of identity, history and culture. Martin Seeds was nominated for the Deutsche Borse Photography Prize 2020 for his solo exhibition, Violence Religion Injustice Death, at Seen Fifteen in 2019.Looking ahead to a significant future moment in UK and Irish history with the 25th anniversary of The Good Friday Agreement in 2023, The Troubles Generation project seeks to examine the legacy of The Troubles from the viewpoint of artists born into its divided society and with lived experience of growing up with conflict as the backdrop to their lives. Taking a phased approach to developing photographic projects and new writing, the ultimate ambition is to create a large-scale touring exhibition in 2023. The project's first phase at Seen Fifteen has been generously supported by the Genesis Kickstart Fund, enabling three solo exhibitions with Martin Seeds, Gareth McConnell and Audrey Blue. Seen Fifteen is an independent emerging gallery and project space in Peckham, South East London. Seen Fifteen’s artistic programme champions contemporary photography with a focus on emerging, diverse and experimental artists who expand the boundaries of the medium. Founded in 2015 by curator Vivienne Gamble, the gallery has hosted a number of widely acclaimed first UK solo shows for breakthrough photographic artists such as Laura El-Tantawy, Jan McCullough, Maya Rochat and Martin Seeds. Follow Martin @martinseeds Seen Fifteen @seenfifteen & Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected]  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats with photographer Tami Aftab. They dive into The Dog’s In The Car - a powerful and intimate collaboration between Tami Aftab and her father Tony, about his short-term memory loss and how it shapes his life and that of the wider family. Since graduating during the pandemic, Tami has worked tirelessly to cement herself as one to watch. During the conversation, we discuss how she works, the pressures of starting out, money, productivity, social media and grappling with the tension between ambition and patience. Tami Aftab is an English-Pakistani photographer based in London. In addition to her personal work, she has shot for clients including Stella McCartney, Google, Hunter, Rapha and Sony Music. She has created editorials for the NYT, Family Portrait Magazine, Riposte, WeTransfer and Atmos, as well as exhibiting at Photoville and Format Festival. Follow Tami @tamiaftab - Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats with artist and educator Zora J. Murff. They deep dive into Zora’s latest book True Colors (or, Affirmations in a Crisis), a manual for coming to terms with the historical and contemporary realities of America’s divisive structures of privilege and caste. Since leaving social work to pursue photography over a decade ago, Zora’s work has consistently grappled with the complicit entanglement of the medium in the histories of spectacle, commodification, and race, often contextualizing his own photographs with found and appropriated images and commissioned texts. True Colors continues that work, expanding to address the act of remembering and the politics of self, which Murff identifies as “the duality of Black patriotism and the challenges of finding belonging in places not made for me—of creating an affirmation in a moment of crisis as I learn to remake myself in my own image.” The book open’s up discussion about education, collaboration, working with institutions, audience and liberation.  Zora J Murff is an Assistant Professor of Art at the University of Arkansas. He received his MFA from the University of Nebraska—Lincoln and holds a BS in Psychology from Iowa State University. Merging his educational experiences, Murff uses his practice to highlight intersections between various social systems and art. He has published books with Aint-Bad Editions and Kris Graves Projects. His monograph, At No Point In Between (Dais Books), was selected as the winner of the Independently Published category of the Lucie Foundation Photo Book Awards. In 2020 Murff was announced as the winner of the inaugural Next Step prize, awarded by Aperture and Baxter St at the Camera Club of New York. His work was presented at the 2021 Rencontres d’Arles, France, as part of the Louis Roederer Discovery Award.Follow Zora’s work here - Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected]  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats with artist Jess T. Dugan. They discuss what it takes to cultivate and maintain an artistic practice, what Jess learned from their own journey, and how the mantra "meet everyone, learn everything," fuelled their approach to both crafting a practice and a business. We cover so much from developing relationships, holding space for reflection, building a community around your work, and what true representation means. Jess is an artist whose work explores issues of identity through photography, video, and writing. Their work has been widely exhibited and is in the permanent collections of over 45 museums throughout the United States. Jess’s monographs include Look at me like you love me (MACK, 2022), To Survive on This Shore: Photographs and Interviews with Transgender and Gender Nonconforming Older Adults (Kehrer Verlag, 2018) and Every Breath We Drew (Daylight Books, 2015).Follow Jess on Instagram @jesstdugan - Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats with editor, writer and curator Elisa Medde. They discuss how an issue of Foam Magazine comes together in addition to a range of issues currently affecting the photo industry. They talk about systems, value, visual literacy, new talent, nurture and the importance of friction and criticism.Elisa is Editor-in-Chief of Foam Magazine, Amsterdam, where she has based a large part of her activities since 2012. With a background in Art History, Iconology and Photographic Studies, Elisa’s research reflects on the relationship between image, communication and power structures. She has been a nominator for a number of prizes and chaired various juries. She loves collaborating with educational programs as a lecturer and jury member, such as KABK, ECAL, Brera Academy, Fotofilmic and many more. Next to curating paper and physical spaces, she regularly writes for Foam Magazine and various publications such as C4 Journal, Something We Africans Got, Vogue Italia / L'Uomo Vogue, YET Magazine and many artists’ books. Follow Elisa on Instagram @elsmdd - Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats to artist and professor Elle Pérez. Elle generously lets us into their world from the early but formative days as a Bronx punk to the ways in which their art has shifted strategies and metaphors and now explores the subtle and visceral moments of emotion and power. We talk about the profound love and intimacy that is the lifeblood of their art and how threads and relationships between types of images and modes of working bring about new gestures.Elle Pérez has had solo exhibitions at MoMA PS1, 47 Canal and Commonwealth and Council. Their work has also been exhibited at the Venice Biennale, the Brooklyn Museum, the Barbican and in the 2019 Whitney Biennial. They are also the Assistant Professor of Art, Film and Visual Studies at Harvard University. Follow Elle on Instagram @elleperex - Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats to artist Anastasia Samoylova who moves between observational photography, studio practice and installation. By utilizing tools and strategies related to digital media and commercial photography, her work explores notions of environmentalism, consumerism and the picturesque. Her new book Floridas: Anastasia Samoylova & Walker Evans was published by Steidl in 2022. In 2020-2021 her ongoing project FloodZone was presented in solo exhibitions at the Chrysler Museum of Art; HistoryMiami Museum; Contemporary Art Museum, Tampa; and The Print Center Philadelphia. The book of the project was published by Steidl in 2019. In 2022 the project will be exhibited at the Eastman Museum. Samoylova is shortlisted for the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize 2022. In this conversation, we discuss Ana’s journey, and how her early work built to where she is today, united by the urgency of climate anxiety and questioning of the pictured world we occupy. We talk about publishing, process, artistic ecosystems, the artist as a cultural worker and much more.  Follow Ana on Instagram @anasamoylova and follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats to photographer and director Campbell Addy. They come together to discuss Cambell’s first monograph Feeling Seen published by Prestel. Much has happened since the pair recorded the first episode back in 2018. This is a truly special episode that speaks to what it means to be a young artist, how to navigate fashion and advertising and not lose yourself, what it means to meet the people who helped form you as an artist and how community shapes everything. Campbell has worked with editorial outlets Vogue, Financial Times, Dazed, Luncheon Magazine, Double Magazine, Wall Street Journal Magazine, Rolling Stone Magazine, and Garage Magazine. His work has been exhibited internationally including at the world-renowned Somerset House. Campbell is also the founder of Nii Journal, a biannual arts and culture publication, and of Nii Agency, a modelling and casting agency dedicated to representing and celebrating diversity. In this conversation, we discuss Campbell’s journey since the first episode, what he has discovered about himself and making work along the way touching upon community, process, creative practice and the future. Check out my first conversation with Campbell on episode 4 here. Follow Campbell on Instagram @campbelladdy - Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected]  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats to the artist Rory Hamovit. Rory uses his work as a site to interrogate and explore notions of masculinity, queerness, performance and history. Rory understands what it takes to really commit to a studio practice - to embrace introspection and humour - to cultivate a space that is unrestrained and playful. His work is about craftsmanship on multiple plains from the physicality of building and making, to always questioning and reframing. He inserts vulnerability as a strategy for world-building. Rory recently graduated with his MFA from Yale School of Art. In this conversation, we discuss Rory’s journey, how he thinks about performance, process, vulnerability, collaboration and so much more.  Follow Rory on Instagram @roryhamovit Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats to the artist Karla Hiraldo Voleau. Karla’s work revolves around identity, vulnerability, love, gender roles and the mechanisms in human relationships. Using a hybrid model of performance, photography and text, she blurs the lines between fiction and reality. Her practice is one that is constantly in community with strangers, grappling with aspects of humanity that we can all relate to, or struggle with. Karla graduated from ECAL (Switzerland), with an MA in Photography in 2018. Her work was featured at the Rencontres d’Arles 2017 & 2019, the Fotomuseum of Winterthur, or the BIP Photo festival of Liège (Belgium) in 2020. She is part of the Foam Talent 2020 edition, and of the Olympus Recommended Fellowship 2020. Her first photobook ‘Hola Mi Amol’ was part of the Aperture First Book Awards in Paris Photo 2019. In this conversation, we discuss Karla’s journey, how she thinks about performance, process, vulnerability, collaboration and audience and so much more.  Follow Karla on Instagram @karla.voleau Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats to the curator, writer and creative consultant Charlotte Cotton. Charlotte has explored photographic culture for over twenty years and held positions including curator of photographs at the Victoria and Albert Museum, head of programming at The Photographers’ Gallery in London, curator and head of the Wallis Annenberg Department of Photography at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and curator-in-residence at Katonah Museum of Art, NY; International Center of Photography, NY; and California Museum of Photography. Her book, The Photograph as Contemporary Art, is published in ten languages and has been a key text in charting the rise of photography as an undisputed art form in the 21st century. In Photography is Magic she surveys over eighty artists whose photographic practices shape the possibilities of our contemporary image environment and in Public, Private, Secret: On Photography and the Configuration of Self addresses the complex intersections of our rights to be seen and heard while claiming the privilege of privacy. She has contributed to many more books and essays exploring photography, art and fashion.  In this conversation, we discuss Charlotte’s journey, how she thinks about the future, process, ethics, collaboration and audience and so much more.  Follow Charlotte on Instagram @pimcharlottecotton Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats to photographer and gallery director Ying Ang. Ying’s work is about active and conscious looking. She grapples with political and social issues that often alter the landscape of our mind in challenging, isolating and revelatory ways. Through unflinching exploration that traverses the boundaries of process, materiality and self, she crafts remarkable works fueled by the type of interior rage that we have seen harnessed as political fuel in so many social movements throughout history. Her recent book, The Quickening: A memoir on matrescence, explores the transformation and lived experience of a woman in her motherhood and postpartum depression/anxiety. The work interrogates the under-represented transition of biological, psychological and social identity during a complex and yet ubiquitous phase of life. In this conversation we discuss process, motivation, grappling with self-censorship, survival and reckoning with the complex reality of being an artist and parent.  Follow Ying on Instagram @yingang Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats to artist Donavon Smallwood who uses the camera as a means of exploring humankind. Through intimate images that transcend surface, he cultivates a deeper sense of consciousness. Despite only shooting for a few years, Donavon has crafted his own visual language, one rooted in a community and a connection with the divine.  In Languor, his first book - an ode to NYC’s Central park - he accentuates the beauty and stillness of nature as well as creating some powerful encounters with strangers. With the pandemic and the history of Seneca Village in mind, the project explores hidden histories and how they impact belonging. The work is an examination of ideas about nature, home, tranquillity, and escape.  In this conversation, we discuss Donavon’s creative process and journey in the industry so far. We talk about balancing commercial, personal and editorial work, influences and his hopes for the future.  Follow Donavon on Instagram @xdonavon Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

 In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats to artist Brea Souders. Brea is known for disrupting our assumptions of what photography is. She does this through a multifaceted practice that defies categorisation. She is constantly shifting tools, processes and strategies, creating images that are unfamiliar and unfixed.  In Eleven Years, her first monograph published by Saint Lucy Books, six bodies of work evoke a sense of wonder while grappling with the enduring challenge of climate change, technology, trauma and belonging. Here, we experience the decisions that form her distinct visual language from fleeting materiality, a seductive use of colour and how she allows chance to infiltrate her rigorous process. In this conversation, we discuss Brea’s creative process and how chance plays a critical part in everything she does. We discuss performance, experimentation, how practice evolves over time and how life and art intertwine.  Follow Brea on Instagram @breasouders Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

 In this episode, Gem Fletcher chats to Emily Keegin, Freelance Photo Director. She has created images for The Fader, No Man’s Land, Time, Bloomberg Businessweek, IBM and many more. As a prominent editor, she understands how the physical, human and cognitive need to blend to make a great photograph. Emily is constantly thinking about how images come into being and how they influence what we see, think and believe. During the pandemic, she began to share her research and reflections on Instagram  - an enlightening experience for anyone fascinated by photography's omnipresent role in our lives. In this kind of casual visual anthropology, she invites us into her particular way of seeing the world with care, humour, joy and endless curiosity. In this conversation, we discuss Emily's relationship to photography and how she thinks about commissioning and working with photographers to support them in doing their best work. We talk about the impact of photography and its relationship to culture and power. We talk about money, the challenges facing editors and photographers in the current climate and much more. Follow Emily on Instagram @emily_elsie Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode, PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe five stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth. We will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Gem Fletcher chats to Rose Marie Cromwell. The Miami-based artist whose work is rooted in the language of documentary photography but subverts many of its tropes by creating tension between the real and the fabricated, the autobiographical and the political to convey lyrical stories about contemporary life, particularly in Latin America and the Caribbean. While her photographs critically address issues of politics, economic injustice, and environmentalism, she takes a sidelong approach, revealing how these powerful forces subtly manifest in the built environment or the human body. Though they depict everyday objects and commonplace scenes, her photographs often verge on abstraction to express dreamlike states and a sense of disorientation in the face of globalization. Throughout the episode we traverse three bodies of work including El Libro Supremo de la Suerte - a portrayal of Cuba created over eight years that continues defying expectations and interpretations. King of Fish, a ten-year project about a community living alongside the Panama canal and Eclipse, a study of the physical, psychological, and spiritual changes of motherhood. In the episode we talk about everything from visual strategies, the role of place and time, building long term collaborations, authorship and the role of photobooks in her practice. Follow Rose on Instagram @rorosiemarie on Instagram and website. Follow Gem @gemfletcher on Instagram. If you've enjoyed this episode PLEASE leave us your feedback and maybe 5 stars if we're worthy in the Apple Podcast store. Thank you for listening to The Messy Truth, we will be back very soon. For all requests, please email [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.