Jem Southam – Rockfalls, River Mouths, Ponds

Whale Chine, 1994, Jem Southam

Jem Southam – Rockfalls, River Mouths, Ponds

On Photography

Brought together here are three series of works made on the south coast of England by leading British photographer Jem Southam. Large format and with a monumental presence, they depict the interplay of natural, cultural and mythical elements.

Southam, born in Bristol in 1950, is one of the UK's leading photographers. He is renowned for his series of colour landscape photographs, beginning in the 1970s and continuing until the present. His trademark is the patient observation of changes at a single location over many months or years.

Southam's subjects are predominately situated in the South West of England where he lives and works. He observes the balance between nature and man's intervention and traces cycles of decay and renewal. His work combines topographical observation with other references: personal, cultural, political, scientific, literary and psychological. Southam's working method combines the predetermined and the intuitive. Southam has exhibited at many galleries and museums including the V&A and Tate. He is Professor of Photography at the University of Plymouth.