I am a London-based photographer, who tries to create emotive photographs by capturing the ordinary in ways that make them extraordinary, which I do by carefully choosing the decisive moments and compositions that bring a scene to life.

My photography is informed by three pillars: (a) the relationship between art and INTENTION, (b) the relationship between the skill of an artist and the production of his/her creation; and (c) authenticity. Before I explain how these three ideals inform my art, I need to explain why I think INTENTION is at the heart of the definition of art.

Take a scene in nature: it may be beautiful, but it's not art, because there is no intention or workmanship behind it. However, when an artist steps into the scene, he or she makes decisions about its presentation (composition) and this intention turns a beautiful scene into a work of art, when combined with skilful workmanship in its production. With painting, workmanship is the skill/intention with brush and paint to execute a vision. With photography, workmanship is the skill/intention to achieve appropriate exposure; correct focus and depth; amongst other things to realise a vision. Thus, art in my opinion, cannot be achieved without vision, intention and skill - these form the basis on which composition and subject matter build.

I therefore stand in antithesis to the artistic ideals espoused by Marcel Duchamp as epitomised in his work “Fountain” (1917), with which he tried to decouple art from its production and the artist's skill and intention. In Duchamp’s opinion, if an artist considers any object to be art, then it is art, regardless of whether it was intended as art or even if is mass produced.

My three pillars address a problem with modern high-tech photography, which is its aggressive focus on using technology and automation to ensure always getting the shot. What this does is reduce the elements of intention and skill from the photographic process in two ways:

1. It puts compositional elements of photography in the hands of software algorithms (autofocus, aperture priority, shutter priority), thereby decreasing the intention of the photographer.

2. It removes the element of skill from the tradition of photography (focusing and camera stability).

The three pillars inform my photography in the following ways:

Firstly, I prefer to use old film lenses on digital sensors, because the lack of autofocus and aperture priority forces me to make decisions that would otherwise be made by the camera and rob the photo of INTENTION. I feel that those decisions should be made by the artist, because they affect composition. Additionally, the ability to manually take a shot are skills that have defined photographers since the inception of the camera. Thus, I see myself as belonging to a time-honoured tradition that todays high-technology driven photography is diverging from.

Secondly, these lenses produce a different aesthetic character to modern lenses, which would otherwise require software to replicate, but that would reduce the photograph’s authenticity.

Thirdly, when editing photographs an element of editorial authenticity is important to me. My goal is to create photos from real light (whether natural or electronic) and not to digitally create light in postproduction. I will manipulate the light already captured by making it darker or lighter, but adding light is not photography - it's the domain of a digital creative. Lastly, I will never fake the crucial components that make a great photograph by adding components that aren’t already there. But, I will remove incidental objects to create cleaner compositions. My photos are therefore not journalistic.