“To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.” Wendell Berry, The Peace of Wild Things, p. 37
There is no doubt that we live in the strange and unfamiliar world of COVID. The past year has been difficult for everyone, but it has also given us the opportunity to pause and contemplate our lives, beliefs and personal goals. Unexpectedly, we had time to re-evaluate society’s value system and gain clarity on what is really important to us. The title of this exhibition, PAUSE, denotes the hiatus when our lives had to be put on hold. It also refers to the break in the hectic routine of modern living, a halt to overconsumption and a time for thinking and self-reflection. The exhibited pieces are the accumulation of this process and to a degree, a manifestation of life under a pandemic. For the exhibiting young photographers, this has been a challenging period marked by restrictions on our freedom and social mobility. We had to be inventive in expressing our thoughts, creative ideals and moral principles through the medium of photography. The end result is an assorted collection of artistic outcomes that also signals the end of our journey through three years of studying photography. During this time, we have learnt a lot about the technical aspects of this medium, and even more about ourselves as we matured and developed our individual vision. What unifies this collection of diverse images is our unwavering confidence in the importance of visual communication and the power of photography. Our creativity is the light that can convey optimism and a belief in our future dreams. We want to bring this light to everyone who visits the exhibition. Please take a look, pause and think. Anna Bainbridge 3
