Cable and Camera: Selfies in 1970s Handsworth
Nearly 50 years ago in inner-city Birmingham, photographers Derek Bishton, Brian Homer and John Reardon set up an impromptu studio in the street and invited their neighbours along. With no camera phones in 1979, long cable releases gave participants the power to decide how they wished to be seen and represented. The project’s original aim was to counter negative media images of Handsworth and its people. Now, in collaboration with Dewi Lewis Publishing, a Kickstarter fund has been set up to bring them together in book form
TL;DR
- Photographers set up an impromptu street studio in inner-city Birmingham in 1979.
- Participants used long cable releases to control their own photographs, acting as an early form of selfies.
- The project aimed to counteract negative media depictions of Handsworth and its residents.
- A Kickstarter fund is being raised to publish the project in book form.
- The book is a collaboration with Dewi Lewis Publishing.