Immediately after Covid lockdown when people started to emerge back into public. I noticed that lots of my male friends had not shaved and therefore grew beards, as most of them are of a certain age their beards were salt & pepper. The newly hirsute faces seem to come form an entirely different era, a more historical time, more Victorian. I wanted to photograph the beards in the historical era they visually suggested, an era more apt for the newly grown beards. I gathered suitable costumes and played ‘dress up box’ with each of the subjects to create fictional characters from years gone by.
After Art college, a photography degree, and four years as a London advertising photographer's assistant, I set up as a professional photographer… Then ran away with the Circus... Fifteen years later, after multiple world tours as a slack-rope walker - while continuing to photograph other performers for their show promo material. I settled in Hackney, London, as a Portrait photographer … It is an ongoing journey of discovery that still inspires me to continue photographing people and their stories.
