Regional Organiser Mary Crowther, (standing) welcomes the attendees and reports back on the Region’s finances RPS Council Member Geoff Blackwell takes the floor
Yorkshire Region pleased by strong turnout for AGM Report and Pictures by Stewart Wall Stewartwall@icloud.com
A STRONGER than expected turnout was welcomed at the Royal Photographic Society’s annual meeting of its Yorkshire Region. What’s new from Zenfolio: Adam Edwards tells all
One of the slides used during the NHS65 talk
Irene Cooper, right, during her theatre workshop talk
The Yorkshire Region sampled a new venue - a beautiful Victorian mansion at Pontefract, formerly owned by banker Thomas William Tew, and now Carleton Community Centre. About 30 attendees met in a stately room resplendent with ornate plasterwork and overlooking beautifully kept lawns and countryside. Shona, Jessica and I have not been to Pontefract before but marvelled at the range of contrasting buildings as we drove through it. We were attending the AGM so that I could give a talk on the Contemporary Group’s NHS65 project. Also speaking were landscape photographer Adam Edwards, representing Zenfolio, and Irene Cooper, who helped organised the Yorkshire Region’s trip to
Photography with a message: Contemporary work from Nigel Tooby the Northern Broadsides theatre workshop at Halifax this year. The business of the AGM was over very quickly. The group heard that there were 452 members in the Yorkshire Region and that most people coming to events were not RPS members. More would be done to try to recruit them next year. The current committee members were re-elected.
Adam then spoke about creating a website and how to market it through Zenfolio, which is currently a supporter of The Society. I used Zenfolio a few years ago for a couple of short commissions and it was good to see how it’s moved on, adding some interesting features along the way. Adam’s buzz phrase is “Super Easy” and I shall be revisiting Zenfolio over the
next few weeks to see if it lives up to the phrase. He showed some marvellous images from photographers who use the site including commercial photographer Laura Tillinghast and wildlife photographer Will Nicholls. For our members who sell their work it was interesting to note that Zenfolio have agreements with both American and Australian labs so it would
be possible to market in these countries from England without worrying about how to get the prints to clients. After lunch I, supported by Nigel Tooby, talked about The Contemporary Group’s NHS65 book project. The NHS was 65 years old in 2013 and the Contemporary Group was planning to compile a photobook featuring 65 images in celebration of this anniversary. When Mary, the Yorkshire Regional Organiser asked me to do the talk I agreed but then wondered what I would talk about as the project has currently stalled. So I decided to talk about why it had stalled. The longer I spend with the Contemporary Group the more demanding I am becoming of why the work exists. The reason the NHS65 project has stalled is because I want more for it. The NHS65 project is something I suggested to The North East Contemporary Group. We have collected some super images so far but we are searching for a reason for the book other than the fact that the
NHS is 65. How should the NHS be defined at this time? There were about 30 people in the audience and after a projected show of a selection of NHS images and a wider personal explanation of how I currently see contemporary photography, Nigel Tooby showed a small selection of his book “Of Our Times: The Price of Money” to explain further how contemporary photographers use photography to tell the story. The audience got involved with making some interesting suggestions about the project and the world of contemporary photography generally. Irene Cooper then ran through some images taken both by herself and the RPS visitors to The Yorkshire Region’s trip to The Northern Broadsides at The Dean Clough Centre in Halifax earlier this year. It was interesting to see how the different photographers had approached the event. It was good to see RPS council member Geoff Blackwell ACCA ARPS and his wife Hazel there, out visiting the regions, a new initiative by The RPS Council.