| Cate McRae - photographs and fine prints | current | portfolio | about | contact | Index |
| about | About my work The portfolio on this site contains a selection of my work since 1998. It includes portraits, and photographs taken from personal projects. In my personal work I like to photograph what is closest to me, whether a boy in the grasses, where I myself wandered as a child; or the corners of a garden or a field, or a room. I do not search for exalted notions of beauty, or truth; just for a moment that at best makes time appear to wait a little. Although I am never caught in the past, I believe memory finds the key to living now and in the future, whether we deal with the familiar, or the strange. And that by looking within, we have a chance to understand a little more about all that surrounds us. I do not believe that landscape of any sort is ever a wilderness, or that objects - inanimate or organic - ever exist without acknowledgment of the human, and therefore the viewer. We are a part of the landcape, and the fabric of life; just as it is a part of us. My hope is simply to reflect this as I can. My photographs originate on film, and for optimum permanence are carefully hand-printed in the darkroom onto silver gelatin fibre-based paper. They are normally toned using a variety of traditional methods, using selenium, sepia or gold, which improves both the aesthetic appearance and the archival quality of the work. Bio I have studied both Photography and Fine Printing at Central St Martin's School of Art and South Thames College, London, at first part-time and finally full-time (finishing 2004). I have also taken courses in the conservation of paper-based materials, including photographs, in the extra-mural department of Camberwell School of Art. In 2005 I was granted the Associateship of the Royal Photographic Society. Originally a Literature student, fortunately just before such courses became less about the power of stories and words than almost completely about theoretical analysis, I was then a teacher in adult education for almost a decade. I have also worked as a writer editing other peoples' work. I have been a poet and short story writer, and have published a little, in literary magazines (e.g. The Rialto) as well as in a couple of Collections. I have previously at various times earned my living as a post-woman, a shop assistant, and a typesetter. I am the mother of two and above all gratefully acknowledge the influence of story-telling, my children, and the power of personal and family history in my photographic work.
Exposure
Online The Portrait Top 25 2006 (Women In Photography International) WIPI Member Spotlight April-Oct 2007
Prints Ilford Photo Commemorative Box 2009 Ilford/APUG Postcard Competition 2006- finalist Solo - Méliès Café Gallery, S. London 'Reflections' Jan 2005 Group - Kingsgate Gallery N. London 'Behind the Scenes' Sept 1998 |
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