Llandrillo FdA Photography Show 2025

Date(s)

13/02/2025 - 15/03/2025

Contact

Various

Description

(Between Then and Now – For Dan)

Each year, Oriel Colwyn takes the opportunity to support and showcase the final show group exhibitions from students completing Llandrillo College’s FdA and BA(Hons) Photography courses.

This February we introduced you to the work of the 2nd year FdA students:

Their show evidenced the various genres of photography that exists within the group, as well as identifying the importance of working together to coordinate a meaningful photographic exhibition.

Opening event – Thursday 13^th February.

The show ran until the 15th March.

Featuring:

Pauline Beacham

Abandoned Buildings, Decay and the Unexpected Beauty Within

“Over the last eighteen months, I have been refining an approach to photography which centres on a destructive or fragmentary process. I have been pushing the production to the edges of representational norms so that the images somehow resonate with the way that I feel about the places I photograph. I’m always looking for the ambiguous spaces that have an energy of their own, where objects and environments begin to collide in interesting ways.

I’m fascinated by redundant spaces such as former worksites or derelict institutional buildings. There is often an essence, spirit or atmosphere that I feel in these places that seems to be a call from their once busy histories. The ghostly shadows of people, long gone, still whispering to us through the chinks and cracks of the buildings. This work aims to capture those feelings, to provoke imagination, to wonder about the fleetingness of time and individual story, and to see beauty in the unusual.“

Scott Lennon

Urdaneta Market

“I was based in Hong Kong as a Consultant Marine Engineer from 2010 until my retirement in 2019. I have travelled extensively in Southeast Asia and over the past 15 years have worked and spent many vacations in the Philippines. My photographs are intended to show the daily life of the ordinary Filipino people, and how the fresh food markets in the towns and cities play an important part of everyday life in the Philippine culture and the economy.

I have chosen to exhibit photographs taken last August in Urdaneta wholesale food market in the province of Pangasinan, on the island of Luzon. The city was founded in 1858 and has earned its name as the “Bagsakan” (trading post) City of Pangasinan, as it serves as the centre for wholesale trading of rice, fish, fruit and vegetables in this area of the province. The market is open 7 days a week, 24 hours a day with fruit and vegetables distributed to towns and villages throughout the district. A typhoon was passing slowly up the east coast, so it rained constantly whilst I was there. It was hot, humid and wet, but trade in the market didn’t stop.”

Sophie Devonshire

Stories in Stone

“The project began as a traditional documentary, focusing on the history and lives of the workers who shaped these landscapes. However, through necessity, it slowly turned into a much more creative and imaginative approach. As I began to grapple with the problem of representing a place that, paradoxically, is so embedded in the national consciousness, it has become almost invisible. The North Wales landscape of slate quarries has been photographed in all its glory by thousands of visitors, climbers, hill walkers and adventurers. Its image is as fixed as the geographical entity itself. We do not see beyond the surface. We fail to recognise the scale in its true sense – the human scale. Some of the biggest quarries found in places like Bethesda, Llanberis and Blaenau Ffestiniog, are testament to the immensity of human capacity. To carve away mountainsides with rudimentary tools. To manoeuvre millions of tons of material to a precise plan so that production would not be hampered by confusion – waste to the right, produce to the left. The privileged Lords who capitalised on the opportunity were quick to scale up the potential and commissioned meticulous geological surveys and engineering plans that mapped out the production lines.

With all of this in mind, I began to imagine myself as a visitor from the future, or another world, encountering these places for the first time. What would I make of it? How would I understand it? What clues would I record and how would they inform my analysis? I thought about the great lost temples of the world, and how the theorists are still proposing their ideas as to their function or the belief systems they represent. Some of these vast quarries could easily be read in the same way. Huge human endeavour against all odds. To leave something colossal as a marker to the future. Not temples to ideas, but something else. I tried to photograph the ‘something else’, I looked for the signage that has long lost its meaning.“

Sian Vaughan

Brynffanigl Isaf

“The age-old saying that ‘Farming is a way of life’ tells us that there is something essential about the vocation. That it has its roots in a primeval moment and that to understand farming is to understand a lineage of surviving. To manage life in the fundamental way. To nurture things that grow and blossom, or to nurture something to sacrifice for food. Managing the environment where this takes place is a rewarding sideshow that often ties the farmer to an acute sense of belonging – difficult to find in most other occupations.

I have spent my life on the farm and so choosing it as the subject of my photographic work did not need too much consideration. I want to capture the memories and essence of the place that shapes who I am today. The land, the people, and the moments there hold a deep sentimental value for me. With time, things change, and I want to preserve the connection to my past before those details fade away, both for myself and future generations. Through these photographs, I hope to tell the story of a place that will always be a part of me.“

David Mojoros

Mundane, Beautiful, Uncanny

Print this. Pin it up. Let it curl at the edges. Or don’t. Who cares? Polaroids—instant, chemical, wonky. One shot. No edits. No filters. Just light hitting paper, now or never.

Here’s a flash of flowers, the grimace of a dog, the flick of a cigarette butt on the pavement. The world’s a collage of near-nothings, all desperate to be seen. And I’m dragging Eggleston through a supermarket car park, stuffing Steve Shaw into a photobooth at 2 a.m. No gloss. No pretense. Just snap-click-here-it-is. The mundane’s got weight. The humdrum hums louder when you trap it on instant film. You ever really stared at a drain cover? A daisy shoved through chain-link? Your nan’s chipped teacup, stained with twenty years of morning routines? That’s the game. No do-overs. No delete button. Just moments, caught and spat out in real-time. Ink, light, shadow, blur—this exhibition isn’t about looking for meaning. It’s about meaning looking for you. It’s about seeing. A full-frontal assault of the obvious. Beautiful. Ugly. Doesn’t matter. It just is. You’ll get it or you won’t. Either way, it’s printed now.

Tesni Hunter

Postcard Views

As a final year student , my work explores the relationship between photographs of places and postcards of those places, focusing specifically on the landscapes of North Wales. Through this project, I have explored the tension between the traditional “postcard” image, and the lived reality of the landscapes I photograph.

North Wales is a region marked by rugged mountains, beautiful coastlines, and rich cultural history, all of which are often distilled into the clichéd views found on postcards. These images offer a snapshot of the place but leave much unsaid. My intention is to challenge this simplification by creating photographs that highlight the subtleties of the landscape, emphasizing textures, light, and fleeting moments that go beyond the conventional tourist view. I strive to capture the quieter, more intimate sides of these places that often go unnoticed, inviting the viewer to reconsider the familiar imagery of North Wales.

The process of photographing for postcards allows me to reflect on how we consume and idealize landscapes. The postcard format, which is traditionally used to send personal messages or memories, adds an additional layer of meaning, suggesting that my photographs are not just static representations but vehicles for storytelling. Through this, I hope to spark a deeper connection between the viewer and the landscape, transforming the postcard from a mere souvenir to a more thoughtful and reflective experience.

Elvie Hands & Sian Vaughan

Butterfly

I’ve decided to create a project centered around childhood trauma and sexual assault—subjects that hold deep personal significance to me. For a long time, I’ve kept these experiences in the background, but now feels like the right time to open up about what happened. Last February, I received the letter regarding my court case, which unfortunately couldn’t proceed due to a lack of evidence. This setback only strengthened my resolve to raise awareness through this project.

The purpose of this work is to show that despite the darkness I’ve faced in my life, I’m here today, surrounded by the best company, and truly thriving. I want others to know that no matter how difficult things may seem, there is always light at the end of the tunnel. That’s why I’ve named this project Butterfly—a symbol of transformation, hope, and rebirth. In Chinese culture, the butterfly also represents freedom, which is a powerful theme for what I want to convey.

When I shared this idea with Sian, she immediately agreed to help bring it to life. Together, we’ve decided to incorporate a music video alongside the images we’ve created, including some childhood photos of me that represent the more innocent times of my life. The music video will showcase my personal evolution, touching on key moments like my parents’ divorce, experiencing sexual assault at a young age, struggles with bullying, and body image issues. I’ll be sharing a raw, honest portrayal of my journey, covering many aspects of my life that have shaped who I am today.