Photojournalism postgraduates to showcase their work online

The London College of Communication is celebrating this year’s photojournalism postgraduates by showcasing their work online.

The students at the Elephant and Castle- based university suffered from the pandemic by not being able to get out to take photos easily.

But they have managed to tell engaging stories despite the restrictions.

Nick Goring’s ongoing project A Castle By the Sea features a series of soft, still images of East Anglia.

The series was inspired by a travelogue of the area he inherited from his grandmother, Cecily Nash, written by her ex-fiance.

The book, called Castle O’ Dreams, describes Christopher Marlowe’s bicycle journey through the Fens and carries an inscription: “To my dearest fiancée with devoted love, From The Author.”

But a few years later Cecily Nash called off the engagement, and married the photographer’s grandfather in 1928.

Inspired by the book, Mr Goring took his own trip of the area, using the book as a guide.

He said: “It has a description of all the places he went to, and I used that as a map to follow, to make sure I went to the same sort of places he went.

“I took my camera with me and responded to feelings of unrequited love, wondering how he must have felt during the period of meeting my grandmother all the way through to being told that she didn’t want to stay with him.”

Timo Spurr, 25, also used his family as a jumping off point for his project Blackstock Road.

Mr Spurr created a photobook documenting cafes, takeaways and grocery shops along the street in Finsbury Park, dedicated to his mother – a Portuguese immigrant who used to run a cafe in the area.

Mr Spurr, who grew up in Finsbury Park, said: “It was a very personal project, because over the last two years I knew I was going to leave, so I began to analyse my relationship with the area.

“I became a lot more critical of the area. I started to pick up on things – my friends and headlines in the news and how they were referring to Finsbury Park. It was very negative.”

The project challenges these ideas by focusing on the other side of the area – and the rich variety of food that it offers.

The photo book even includes recipes from the cafes featured. Another student who aimed to challenge perceptions is Aniruddha Dey, 33, in his project Reflections on Disaster.

The aim of the project is to highlight the role of the British war-time government in the 1943 Bengal famine, which led to the deaths of three million people.

Photos in Mr Dey’s project include a photo of Churchill’s plinth juxtaposed with a photo of a Bengali famine victim placed on a sideboard.

Main Pic: From Nick Goring’s ‘A Castle By the Sea’ series