First Light Spotlight interviews (Open Eye Gallery)




See the full programme of interviews here on YouTube, recorded through April 2021.

This season of talks,  presented by Laura Robertson and curator Mario Popham, will bring together the photographers, writers and educators who are central to First Light – an exhibition and book of new photography criticism on New Northern Photo Graduates.

Together they will discuss the ideas and inspiration behind the images, the potential for collaboration across disciplines, the relationship between the image and the word and the role educators play in the early development of artistic practice.



Corrupted Archives: Discussing the glitch aesthetic as an intervention in photography, and specifically its potential as a visual metaphor for the fractures and ruptures to family life caused by addiction, disorder or trauma. Hosted by arts writer and First Light editor Laura Robertson, this First Light Spotlight will be on UCEN Manchester BA Photography graduate Schnel Franzine and her photocollage series ‘ISOlation Relations’. They’ll be joined by special guests Programme Director of Photography at UCEN Manchester, curator and writer Andrew Moseley, plus University of Salford Fine Art graduate, writer and researcher Eleanor Woodley, who’ll be reading a new text in response to Schnel’s work.



After Nature: Laura Robertson in conversation with Sam Wallis, Robin Fanner and John Aitkin. In recent years, scientists have proven plankton’s ability to digest the smallest of ocean plastics, known as microplastics. What impact is this having on the complex ecological systems that we live in? On our health or even genetic structure? In this First Light Spotlight, BA Photography graduate (Blackpool and the Fylde) Sam Wallis discusses how his mixed-media photography series ‘Questionable Inedible’ acknowledges these concerns, in a panel hosted by arts writer and First Light editor Laura Robertson. Joined by special guests from the University of Central Lancashire (UCLan), John Aitken, who is MA & BA Course Leader in Photography and Sam’s MA tutor, plus BA Fine Art graduate and current MA student, Robin Fanner, who reads a new text in response to Sam’s work.