Featured image, Emily Green by Polly Alderton.
“The faces in these photographs look out at us on an equal footing. Asking to be seen and heard. Not as case studies or statistics. People. Lives being lived. Each telling us a small but significant part of their story. Not as background colour to grit up a screen drama, or as council estate fodder for a tabloid scrounger story. These aren’t the bit-parts – today these are the heroes.”
From the foreword by Michael Sheen.
A decade of austerity and cruel government policy has pushed many Britons further into poverty, and created an increasingly volatile and polarised society.
Featuring the work of a number of award-winning photographers alongside some talented newcomers, Invisible Britain tells the stories of those living in the UK’s most marginalised communities, those often ignored or, at times, denigrated and scapegoated by politicians and the media.
Editor Paul Sng, a writer and filmmaker, features work focusing on those who challenge the status quo, and felt a book of stories and photographs would directly present the truth of those involved, as opposed to documentaries which tend to be more faithful to the directors concept of truth, rather than the person’s or people’s who are the subject of the film. He was also interested in working with photographers, and the challenge they face representing a person in a single image.
The result is both intimate and powerful, stories of hope and defiance in the face of
adversity, of particular relevance at a time of uncertainty and political upheaval in the UK.
Invisible Britain: Portraits of Hope and Resilience, is published by Policy Press. For more information and to buy the book, visit their website.
