Photo Fringe 2024

Why do photographers create images of other people? Whose narratives are under-represented? Who is overly spoken for? Where do audiences encounter these photographs? Who is in control? These are some of the questions at the core of Anthony Luvera’s practice, where the participants in his projects are invited to work collaboratively to represent their lives and experiences.

Oliver Mansell spoke to Anthony online, following the completion of his 2024 Brighton Photo Fringe exhibition, Families Living in Temporary Accommodation, presented by the Socially Engaged Art Salon at the Jubilee Library in Brighton.

Oliver Mansell (OM): How did your relationship with photography begin?

Anthony Luvera (AL): I have an uncle who worked as a private investigator. When I was about 15 years old, he gave me a SLR camera and lenses. Around the same time, one of my teachers gave my best friend and me equipment to set up a darkroom at home. We taught ourselves how to use the camera, to develop black-and-white film, and to print photographs. After a while, we thought we were good at it and we posted an advertisement in the local newspaper offering classes to teach people photography. The adults who arrived to learn how to develop their camera skills and use a darkroom were often surprised to be greeted by two teenagers!

Later, I went to university to study English Literature and Writing, and I took an additional class in photography. I was so inspired by the people who taught me, Max Pam and Kevin Ballantine in particular, that I decided to change my degree studies to focus on Photomedia with a minor in Writing. At that time, I was mostly interested in fashion and portraiture. It wasn’t until after I’d moved from Perth in Australia to London in 1999, when a few years later my work took a collaborative turn, and I began to focus on homelessness and housing justice issues.

Lily-Rose, 3; Rachael, 20
‘It was a hotel about half an hour away from everyone that I knew. I was there for six weeks and then they called me one Friday morning and said, “We're moving you.” It was like just a small contained flat sort of thing. It was terrifying, cos I was being sent to this place and you don't get given any information except the address. And when you turn up, you don't know what you're going to find. I'm a student nurse and I had to wash my uniforms. I had to take it to a launderette to wash my uniforms every night, which was costing me money that I didn't have. I worked so hard to get onto that course. I was a young mum. I had my baby at 16. Everybody said, “You won't do it. You won't do it. You won't do it.” And I’m proving everyone wrong.’
from Families Living in Temporary Accommodation by Anthony Luvera

OM: How pivotal do you think your education in writing and literature has been to both your practice and your approach to photography?

AL: Reading and writing is still a very important part of my practice. Using writing to critically reflect on the process of creating my projects and working with participants is a key part of my work with photography. It enables me to articulate the questions, challenges, and ethical dilemmas that I encounter in the work. When I was studying photography at undergraduate level, I was exposed to critical writing about representation by artists and writers such as Martha Rosler, Allan Sekula, and others who critique photography from a Marxist perspective. I can see how these ideas continue to resonate through my practice today.

OM: You’ve been making work about homelessness across the UK for over 20 years. What initially drew you to make images within these communities?

AL: In 2002, I was invited by someone working for the homeless charity, Crisis, to photograph at a shelter event held over the Christmas period. I felt uneasy about the invitation, and I said I’d prefer to see what the people I met would take pictures of. A few months later, I was doing some consultation work for Kodak on their single-use cameras, and I was able to access many disposable cameras and processing vouchers. I went back to Crisis and volunteered at the following Christmas shelter and I set up a photography workshop at an activity centre in Spitalfields in East London. Every Friday afternoon, participants would come along to the workshop to take cameras away to photograph their experiences and the things they’re interested in. Later, I developed a way of working with participants to use professional equipment to create what I call an ‘assisted self-portrait’.

Since then, in cities and towns across the United Kingdom, I’ve created work with people experiencing homelessness using photography, sound, text, performance and socially engaged methods. Typically, I will embed myself within a support service to work alongside a team of professionals who provide assistance with healthcare, employment, education, and social support.

OM: What compels you to continue to create participatory projects with individuals and families experiencing homelessness?

AL: I am interested in inviting people with lived experience to play an active role in the process of making work about their lives. Hopefully, this will enable the images to be inscribed with a more nuanced representation of the individuals and the issue of homelessness.

The work on show for Brighton Photo Fringe is called Families Living in Temporary Accommodation. I was embedded within a team of Focused Care Practitioners at Shared Health Foundation in Greater Manchester, who have a range of health and social care backgrounds, such as community midwives, social workers, doctors, nurses, and psychologists. I spent time developing relationships with the families, inviting them to co-create portraits and to record conversations about living in temporary accommodation and their experience of homelessness.

Ali, 8; Maryam, 39; Rizwan, 6
‘I left my husband's house last year, and then I had no help. I paid about half of my benefit, which I was getting that time, on transport. There was no kitchen facility. I asked them, and the ladies who were living there, they asked, if we could get our own microwave and use it in the hotel, so we could warm up our food. Because, if we buy from the takeaway in the morning, if we buy for dinner as well, we could warm it up in the room. But they said, “No. You can't use the microwave. You can't use the toaster.” For health and safety reasons, we were not allowed to use. I had no choice, some sandwiches, or biscuits, cakes. That's it.’
from Families Living in Temporary Accommodation by Anthony Luvera

OM: Do you see there being much of an overlap between your teaching in more formal education settings and the teaching involved with your assisted self-portraits?

AL: Yes, I think there is absolutely a link between my work in photography education – whether that’s for community photography projects, schools, the public programmes for museums and galleries, or in higher education – and my socially engaged photography. I enjoy facilitating other people’s understanding of and enthusiasm for photography. In some ways, it reminds me of my earliest experiences of photography, which involved teaching other people photography while I was still figuring it out myself.

OM: The work is currently on show at the Jubilee Library as part of Brighton Photo Fringe 2024. How integral is the showing of the work in public settings?

AL: I have always embraced exhibiting my work in the public realm. I like the way this can enable the work to potentially reach many more people than would ordinarily go to a gallery. It’s not that I don’t like working in museums or galleries, but when doing so, I like to think differently about audiences and how to engage them. Early in my career, I was invited to exhibit the work made with people experiencing homelessness as the public art program of the London Underground, which at the time was called Platform for Art and is now called Art on the Underground. This opportunity really taught me the value of presenting work in the public realm and reaching people in unexpected ways.

OM: The work was recently shown in the Upper Waiting Hall in the UK House of Commons at the Palace of Westminster. How was the exhibition received?

AL: When Families Living in Temporary Accommodation was exhibited in Westminster, colleagues who work for the policy and communication departments of the charities Shared Health Foundation and Just Life were stationed in the exhibition. They were there to encourage parliamentary staff, MPs, and Lords, to engage with the exhibition and pay attention to the issues it presented. In many respects, we had a captive audience of people involved in contributing to policy and legislation. My aim with exhibiting the work in that space was to provide the project as a tool for campaigning.

OM: You have worked with a number of different mediums within your projects, why do you feel compelled to keep making still images?

AL: I’m open to embracing other mediums and methods, depending on the project, who I am working with, and what it is I’m seeking to represent or express. I am interested in the many ways that photographs are implicated in our everyday lives and the problems of representation they pose. Ultimately, I’m compelled to think critically about the use value of photographs, photographic practices, and the power dynamics involved in making images.

Max, 8; Melody, 6; Murphy, 12; Rachelle, 40
‘Social services got involved. The social worker, she saw what was going on, she saw through the maliciousness of the children's dad, and she did everything she could to help me get out of there. I just felt like I were being stereotyped, you know? Which I have felt a lot in the system, you know? I don't feel like I should have to say, “I've worked 25 years in the NHS”, or “I've done this”, or “I've been there”, or “I've done that.” You should just be treating somebody with that sort of respect regardless of the background. I just felt I was being stereotyped as a single mum with three kids, you know, on benefits, never worked a day in her life, blahdy blahdy blah. That’s how I felt.’
from Families Living in Temporary Accommodation by Anthony Luvera

Oliver Mansell is a research-based photographer and picture-framer based in Cambridgeshire. His work concerns intersubjective connections through our social, physical and technological environments.

Title image caption:
Igor, 8; Maja, 40; Radek, 17
‘I fled from domestic abuse. And, after one month, I came into the temporary accommodation. Your life is in a mess because of the domestic abuse. You're not thinking straight. Most of us, you know, we don't have access to our money. The guy will not let you spend money. And we came to the refuge with two bags, with nothing. You leave all your stuff behind you… But if you keep that stuff you have to pay for the place where they keep it. It's wrong. They should think about how we are human – not a case, not paperwork – and we suffer.’
from Families Living in Temporary Accommodation by Anthony Luvera