Elle Newman

I recently went to London to see English as a Second Language exhibition at Summerset House. The exhibition celebrated the work of Hanna Moon and Joyce Hg, two of the most in-demand fashion photographers of the time. The exhibition explores Moon’s reflection on her personal experiences of living in the UK and Ng’s explores street casted models in natural environments to create images which are both familiar yet surreal taking inspiration on a sixteenth-century Chinese novel ‘Journey to the West’. The exhibition also highlights both Moon’s and Ng’s fashion photography from the last few years where their work has featured in top publications such as Dazed and iD.  The exhibition explores the artists’ feelings of being ‘lost in translation’, a feeling which, as artists living in a foreign city navigating different languages and shifting landscapes, informs Moon and Ng’s search for capturing beauty in the often overlooked and unseen narratives in our everyday lives.

I found this exhibition really inspiring, the photography was amazing and the images were breathtaking. Moon and NG find beauty in places and objects that have often been overlooked by most that grew up around it. I will take inspiration from this exhibition as it has given me inspiration for when I conduct my shoots. I want to shoot round Brighton as my company and products are from here, but I have lived in Brighton my whole life. This exhibition has made me realise that I need to shoot as though I have never been to Brighton before so that I don’t overlook a place that I have become so familiar to me.