Secret Dockyard Project

BA Photography student Andrew Paul Hayward has started a project in Portsmouth’s Historic Dockyard. Secret Dockyard is a photographic study of the Conservation, Preservation and Restoration areas off limits to the public. Andrew is now in his final year of the course and is the first student in over 4 yrs to use a large format 10 x 8 camera.

“I like to think of my work as contemporary photography using traditional methods. The Portsmouth Naval Base Property Trust (PNBPT) have been amazingly helpful and co-operative in producing the work and it is scheduled to be exhibited at our degree show both in Portsmouth and in London in June of this year.”

His website can be viewed at with more examples of his work : http://www.andrewpaulhayward.com/

Below Storehouse 10

Below Boathouse 4 Sea Channel

Below Lock Gates Boathouse 4

Little Theatres Exhibition at The New Theatre Royal

The New Theatre Royal has had a great response to their call for artwork for their Little Theatres Art Exhibition. We mentioned this in a previous post a few weeks ago. The exhibition was opened by Sheila Hancock yesterday and all works can currently be seen in their Circle Gallery. Participants from all ages have exhibited a wide range of work in different formats. Well worth a visit along with grabbing a coffee and something to eat at the Conservatory Cafe.

Matt Sills shoots Mark Pain – Sports Photographer of the year 2011

Photographer Matt Sills took over Portsmouth Indoor Tennis club last week for a photo shoot with Mark Pain the British Sports Photographer of the year. I popped along with my Strong Island hat on to take some photos behind the scenes. The shoot was part of an ad campaign for Focus on Imaging at Birmingham in March 2012. There is also an app available for download which was developed in Portsmouth – keeping it local again!

Photographers Robert Dowling and Perou  have also been featured as part of this campaign. Behind the scenes footage can be seen on Matt’s website.

Mark Pain spoke to me about the incredible shot he took of Tiger Woods with the golf ball heading straight for his camera. Luckily for him it only damaged the camera hood and filter and earned him a lot of PR attention on live US TV. A well deserved award for a great photographer. Thanks to Matt for the invite – always good to see Portsmouth being used for shoots like this.

Below: Mark Pain’s shot of Tiger Woods.

Below: Final image by Matt Sills

Behind the scenes footage from Portsmouth Tennis Centre below

Created Local – Jonathan Ring

Jonathan Ring is a student who in his own words “adores design/posters/photography and being all creative!’ He went to Priory school and is now in his second year of Fareham College. He has always lived in lovely Southsea! Strong Island has featured some of his work before.

Jonathan is currently looking at courses to continue his creative education and has put together a great magazine showcasing his projects. The magazine preview can be seen via this link – http://issuu.com/jonathanring/docs/retrospectif

His website is at http://jonathanring.tumblr.com/

Strong Island Sunrises and Sunsets

January 2012 has been a haven for incredible sunrises and sunsets and been captured across the city by many photographers.

A selection below from Tall Thin Guy, John Scriven, Tim Aldworth, Martin Hoy and Andrew Whyte. See more from these photographers by clicking on their images below.

The Caravan Gallery – New Book Launch, Art Sale & 6×4

This weekend at (GASP) Gallery Art Space Portsmouth there are numerous events happening:
Is Britain Great? 3 – The Caravan Gallery exhibition and book signing
Reasonably Priced Art – A selling show of original paintings, prints, drawings and more by members of Art Space Portsmouth
6 x 4 – Another chance to buy fantastic original postcard-sized art works

‘Is Britain Great 3′ is the new book by Jan Williams and Chris Teasdale – The Caravan Gallery. This is their third book in their bestselling Is Britain Great? series and published by Cornerhouse.

Their unique take on social documentary is refreshing and always opens the viewers eyes to their surroundings. Seeing things and finding humour in the everyday. The book also features essays from Sara-Jayne Parsons (Exhibitions Curator at the Bluecoat, Liverpool) and Dan Thompson (founder of the Empty Shops Network and co-founder of Culture on Wheels). The book has photographs taken in Wales, Scotland and England. Of course with my welsh roots I have always thought that the land of my fathers was ripe for the taking and Jan and Chris visited the Elvis Festival back in September to capture a weird weekend in Porthcawl. You have to buy the book to see the results.

“We find Portsmouth utterly photogenic because it’s a unique island city boasting a crazy cocktail of ingredients. Smart aspirational buildings lurk alongside traditional, sometimes shabby and forgotten areas. There’s a strong sense of identity and no shortage of character and creativity. You never know what you’re going to find next when you roam the streets of the city and go off the beaten track. Things are always in a state of flux. When we were immersed in our Pride of Place Project at Space Gallery, University of Portsmouth earlier this year we forced ourselves to look at Portsmouth in a new light. We made plenty of exciting new discoveries about the city in which we’d lived for years just by deviating from the routes we generally take.” Jan Williams and Chris Teasdale.

They are doing an extra special deal over the weekend – signed copies of the book will be available at the astounding price of £10 (RRP £15).

See the Facebook page for further details of this weekend’s events – http://www.facebook.com/events/188075371281003/

Photographs below feature in ‘Is Britain Great? 3′ and have all been taken in Portsmouth.

“The original doughnuts picture was taken in 2008, the second in 2010. The credit crunch has resulted in a doughnut downturn!”
Jan Williams

The winner of the Anglepoise competition

A few weeks ago we launched a competition along with Anglepoise for Strong Islanders to send in images of their Anglepoise lamps to win a copy of the Kenneth Grange book ‘Making Britain Modern’.

The winner chosen by Simon Terry who is head of innovation and development at Anglepoise Ltd is Jett Abrook from Southsea. Jett used his Anglepoise to light his collection of cars.

We also had some amazing entries from Paul Thurlow and Philip Bennett.

All photographs are submitted below. In order – The winner Jett Abrook, Paul Thurlow and Philip Bennett.

Jett Abrook with his copy of the book.

Below Paul Thurlow and Philip Bennett.

Lovely Things at The Spring

The Spring Arts & Heritage Centre in Havant are having a Christmas Fair tomorrow (Saturday 26th November). They will be offering a large selection of original and tempting gifts. Including jewellery, textiles, ceramics, art, Christmas delicacies and Christmas decorations. It will also feature work by Southsea artist Roo Abrook. Free entry and open 10.30am to 4.30pm.

For further details visit their website – http://www.thespring.co.uk/

Roo Abrook’s work featured below.

Monk Jam 2

Monk Jam is back and this time with a twist. Last year they held a day of street art, music and an indoor record fayre at Little Johnny Russell’s on Albert Road.
Monk Jam 2 – They have carefully selected for your pleasure 20 artists from near, far and of varying choices in artistic application.

Each artist will be given the same brief and 72 hours to create a bespoke piece of wall hung art no larger then A2. Once the deadline has passed all work will then go on display in the Like a Tea Tray in the Sky gallery on Osbourne Road, Southsea. The public will then be able to cast their vote for their favourite piece.

The show will run from the 6th till the 11th of December and all votes will be counted and the winning artist will receive a special prize.

Throughout the week raffle tickets will be on sale for all the pieces will be up for grabs, perfect timing for you to win a special one of a kind xmas present for loved ones. The first 20 raffle tickets sold will also receive a limited addition hand pulled silk screen print of the event poster, so get in quick to get yours.

This is going to be a ‘not to be missed’ event. Check out their Facebook to keep in the loop.

Last years event

Strong Island 11/11/11

Thanks to those of you that added photographs to the Strong Island 11/11/11 Flickr group.

Scenes from around the city below from: Quiet Corners, Southsea Dave, John Scriven, Duncan Toms and Claire Sambrook.

PRIMARY – Extended & Improved

We have some great news about our PRIMARY phonography exhibition (find out all the details here) that we can now announce:

- The deadline for submissions has now been extended to Sunday 4th March. We have had some incredible submissions but want to set aside more time to make the exhibition something really special.

- The competition is now open to up to 10 submissions from each individual. With the ability to capture many photos on your phone over the next two months we we want you to not feel restricted to just three. The same rules apply about the photos conforming to compositions using the primary colours though. If you have already submitted feel free to send more photos over as and when you please.

- The exhibition will be hosted by Albert Road’s own Bonzo Studio who are also partnering up with us in the creation of the exhibition space. More news on this soon!

- Finally, we will be running a competition as part of the exhibition where the best three photos submitted will win some incredible prizes. We will be announcing the prizes available very soon but got to say, these will be the best prize haul we have ever offered.

- We will be putting together a poster for the exhibition that will be on sale on the opening night. The poster will feature some of the best submissions and all profits from the sales will go to a local charity (details to follow soon). Due to this we need to say that any photos submitted to PRIMARY will involve you giving us permission to use them for commercial purposes, if you do not want your photo used in this way simply let us know via email.

Well, that is it for now! We really hope to drum up as much coverage locally for PRIMARY in the next couple of months so if you could Facebook/Tweet/+1 about the exhibition we would really appreciate it. We would love this exhibition to be a real reflection of the whole population of Portsmouth with everyone taking part and feeling involved.

It’s going to be a Strong Movember – Closed at £725

Righto chaps, it’s time to clean shave your boat race and get that mighty moustache on the grow in support of Movember for The Prostate Cancer Charity and the Institute of Cancer Research. For 30 days of November you can help support and raise awareness through selflessly parading your top lip for charity.

You can sign up yourself, as I’m sure many of you already have, or you can join the Strong Island team and seek out sponsorship as a team. Through the Strong Island Movember page you can ask people to join the group, make donations, upload photos and post updates via the MoSpace page, Facebook and Twitter.

Head over to www.mobro.co/StrongIsland if you would like to get involved and grow a Strong Moustache to help raise awareness, or simply head over to www.uk.movember.com and sign up to personally raise money.

The funds raised in the UK support the number one and two male specific cancers – prostate and testicular cancer. The funds raised are directed to programmes run directly by Movember and our men’s health partners, The Prostate Cancer Charity and the Institute of Cancer Research. Together, these channels work together to ensure that Movember funds are supporting a broad range of innovative, world-class programmes in line with our strategic goals in the areas of awareness and education, survivorship and research.

Poster: Tristan Savage