Last weekend saw the very welcome return of Hackney WickED, the annual weekend long arts festival that turns the normally quiet streets of the Wick and Fish Island into bustling thoroughfares, worthy of Oxford Street on a Saturday afternoon!
Although the major draw to the area for most visitors was the opportunity to visit the artists’ studios, perhaps snapping up some bargain-priced artwork, or checking out the live music, craft fair and food in Queens Yard, I had a different purpose for visiting…
I was on my way to the auditorium of the Yard Theatre for an hour-long talk by Dave from Shoreditch Street Art Tours on how best to capture street art, followed by a two hour walk around the area to put what we’d learned into practice. Now I’m no novice when it comes to photography but you never stop discovering new techniques and ideas, and I was surprised at how little I really knew about snapping this particular form of public art in an effective and compelling way…
After the talk (more on some of the salient points that came up in a moment) it was time for us to undertake our circuitous route of Hackney Wick. Maneuvering around the growing crowds we saw the bright new coating that the abandoned Lord Napier pub has received in the last few days, and a few other brand new pieces of street art. Apparently just prior to the start of Hackney WickED several of the locally-based artists had been out painting, spraying and pasting up their work. I was quite awed by the fact that were were very probably the first group to subject these pieces to close examination, and to capture them for posterity…
Now in terms of photographic techniques, I won’t spoil the surprise (or indeed deprive Dave of revenue) by telling you everything that I discovered, but I will pass on two key points that you should bear in mind when photographing street art. Firstly, it’s important to put it into context i.e. to demonstrate how it interacts with its surroundings, or indeed to show how people react to it. Secondly, when you’re bored with capturing a piece of street art straight on (which is a bit like photographing a painting – a rather uninspiring thing to do IMHO) you could think about abstracting the image in some way. The most obvious, but by no means only, way to do this is to use reflective surfaces to distort the image – perhaps capturing the art in a puddle, across a canal or indeed in a car wing mirror, as we attempted to do on Sunday afternoon!
Below you’ll see some of the photographs that I took on Sunday – hopefully they show that I managed to retain some of the advice that I received earlier in the day. If you’re interested in spending a morning, an afternoon or indeed an evening on one the Shoreditch Street Art Tours yourself, you’ll find the dedicated page here – they’re run throughout the week and over the weekends. Regular prices are just £15 for adults and £10, and you couldn’t have a better teacher – I found David’s style really inspiring. You don’t need an expensive camera either – the techniques that you’ll learn can be used even if you only have a smartphone to hand…
Shoreditch Street Art Tours also has a dedicated Facebook page, and there’s a group on Flickr where you can see some of Dave’s work, as well as photographs taken by people on the tour. As always, you’ll find the remainder of my images of the day over on Google+.
