Once Upon a Time | The National Literacy Trust
If I were to choose how I’d like to be described, alongside ‘photographer’, I would choose ‘storyteller’. I don’t use this word lightly and I appreciate it has become more in vogue in recent years, adopted by many practitioners, researchers and artists. But for me, storytelling holds so much curiosity, possibility, connection and magic. This is what I enjoy and anticipate each time I hold up my camera.
A charity I’ve had the honour of working with over the past few years is the National Literacy Trust (NLT). The first time I was invited to photograph one of its events was very special. It was to celebrate a newly developed library at a local primary school. I unexpectedly felt a connection between me photographing a story about the day, which itself was themed around books and storytellers. I was able to show a part of an organisation dedicated to empowering people of all ages to improve their literacy skills.
Libraries for Primaries was founded in 2021 by the NLT, of which Her Majesty Queen Camilla is patron. The campaign brings together charities, publishers and businesses to address the lack of investment in primary school libraries, particularly in the UK’s most disadvantaged communities where one in four primary schools doesn’t have a library. By working within these schools, the NLT helps to give each child a voice in telling their own stories, in all kinds of ways.
It was at this first event that I learned I would also be photographing Queen Camilla. A high-profile event such as this means a high-profile calling of press photographers and journalists, ready to fast-track their images and words to news outlets ahead of the event finishing. As I lingered a few moments longer,
I saw not only a queen, with an impeccable demeanour, greeting and conversing with the school community, authors and dignitaries in her role as patron, but I also saw a mother and grandmother, whose face genuinely lit up when engaging with the children, recalling with them precious bedtime stories read with her own family.
At these school events I met my own family’s literary heroes: world-renowned authors such as Cressida Cowell of How to Train Your Dragon and Jeff Kinney of Diary of a Wimpy Kid, along with the inspiring Children’s Laureate of Wales (2021–23), poet Connor Allen. My mind filled with memories of bedtime stories with our teenaged daughter, when we’d put on voices and act out swooping dragons from these books. We read these classics on a night-time loop, until she was able to read them for herself.
And here I was at this event, reliving those magical early years of reading to her, through photographing some of the library spaces being created in these schools.
Reading is not just about receiving stories from the pages of a book. It can be expressed in so many other ways. I experienced this first hand recently when photographing a theatre group who collaborated with the children from a Swindon primary school. That wonderful phrase ‘from page to stage’ was brought to life as I watched them create a play from a storybook, interpreted their way. The room was filled with method actors making each character their own. All the while, they boosted each other’s morale throughout these sessions to the final performance.
Then there are the special, unplanned moments – like being introduced to the schools’ wellbeing dogs, and listening to children read passages of their favourite books to the very authors who have written them.
At each of these NLT events, I see storybooks spring into life. At the last one, this happened in the style of a game show in a south Wales valley primary school, hosted by none other than author and illustrator Jeff Kinney. He was en route to the Hay Festival where he was giving a talk, and had offered to spend the morning with a school close by. Fingers on the buzzers, amid shrieks of laughter, this became a quick round of Diary of a Wimpy Kid scenarios as teachers had to act out crazy scenes and test out their own book knowledge.
With the help of many cross-sector partners, the NLT has transformed 1,000 primary school libraries to date. Together with partner support, it has gifted hundreds of thousands of books. It means that children, like the ones I’ve met, get to read of mystical adventures in faraway lands, or discover characters within the pages of books who are not dissimilar to themselves. That is truly the magic of storytelling.
For more information about the Libraries For Primaries project and the charity's other collaborations, visit The National Literacy Trust
This story features in the Late Summer issue of Juno Magazine
For the love of dance | a day in the life of a show photographer
For The Love of Dance
“Dear Jeanie’s mum, please make sure that you don’t forget Frankie the Elephant for next week’s dance class, love from Miss Angela.”
This was the note my daughter, then aged three, came out of her ballet class with, waving it at me with a look of defiance. Less than an hour before, she had gone into her lesson in floods of tears. You see, we’d rushed out of the house, leaving said toy elephant (her weekly dancing mascot) on the hall table.
Angel School of Dance was such a huge part of our lives for nearly 15 years. That note, handwritten in the moment by the dance school’s founder and principal, Miss Angela (as she is respectfully and affectionally called by her students) displays the fierce loyalty and protectiveness she has for dancers.
This was when I first realised how much she genuinely cares and values each of them, from
toddlers to adults, as if they are her own.
Over the years we took part in the most monumental dance shows. Which showcase the
talent and dedication of generations of dancers that have been through the school. More recently, I see dancing mothers performing in one number to be followed by their child dancer in the next – testimony to the nurturing ethos of Angel School of Dance.
The early days of these shows had me backstage with other parents, among the glitz and flurry of
speedy costume changes, the air filled with loud chatter, a hazy fog of hairspray and pre-show
nerves. Corridors of bustling tutus, little ones let loose to smear lashings of gold eye shadow
and red lipstick over each other.
I would be there, one hand helping my own little dancer into a Lycra zebra costume,
the other hand holding my camera, recording these behind-the-scene moments, not only for myself but for other parents as well.
The first time I was invited to photograph the performers on stage, as well as capturing these dressing room
stories, was in March 2020. It was there and then that we all felt the true meaning of ‘the show
must go on.’ The glitter and hairspray were matched with hand
sanitiser and scaled up hygiene.
Those early COVID-19 news items added a sobering veil to the usual sparkling
shenanigans of backstage excitement. The heightened consideration and camaraderie between the show team and dancers gave a never-truer reflection of the community spirit within this incredible dance school.
The show that followed was called From Now On and paid tribute to this time. As I ran around
between performances, trying to cover all angles and moments, I realised it
was my daughter’s dance next. I lowered my camera, suddenly feeling all kinds of emotions at
seeing her go up on her pointe shoes for the first time. This was her last dance show, as afterwards she decided to stop her dancing.
So here I am at this most recent show, with just one role – that of show photographer and no longer a dance mum
– staring in wonder at the talent across the ages of hundreds of dancers, the
many months of choreography, the pre-show laughter and tears around me and the beaming faces
as they step out onto the stage. I’m back with my dance family once more.
“Dear Miss Angela, I’m really sorry but I have to stop my dancing for now as I need to concentrate on my school exams. Thank you for all the years you have taught me and the great experiences I’ve had, love from Jeanie.”
Learning Self Worth | Cyfannol Women's Aid Photographic Project
“I stamped the word ‘safe’ on the back of the bracelet, so that if I get scared I can rub my fingers over the letters and remember that I’m safe”
I am proud of myself. Five seemingly simple words we don’t often say and they are not heard often enough in our teenagers’ world. I make no secret of my own parenting challenges around raising a teenaged girl. Constantly scrambling around for the right words of encouragement and wisdom and regularly feeling like “ you just don’t get it mum.”
While I watched these five words, along with words like ‘safe’ being engraved on the inside of bracelets, made by girls of similar ages to my own daughter, I felt certain parallels in her life to theirs. But I also know that the dynamics of their family lives are so very different to her own.
“I sometimes get anxious so be having these words close to me it reminds me that I can achieve anything”
It was several years ago that I joined a Women’s Aid organisation to photograph some of the support services for women and children who have experienced domestic abuse. Watching these courageous women and their children become empowered as they began realising their self-worth has, without doubt, shaped my approach over the years to the relationships I witness and form within the communities I photograph. By seeking out the can do’s and the shall’s gives me a connection and a visual to the hope that I want to portray in my work.
So as the legacy of that project has continued over time, it was earlier this year that Cyfannol Women’s Aid asked me to make a series of photographs to illustrate some of its incredible support groups.
The first group I attended was a girls’ summer jewellery-making workshop, where they each created a silver bangle over a few weeks. With the talent and creative support of a local silversmith and the emotional and guiding support of the group facilitator, I watched as these bangles took on their layers of meaning and ownership. Holding each girl’s story as they wove them intrinsically and intentionally into beautifully crafted silver bangles.
It was in this space that we all got lost in the art of making, owning stories and celebrating them with their chosen words to remind them not only of their friendships and self worth, but that they also each created their own legacies that day.
“ I know there are many others like me, but everyone’s journey is different and that’s why I chose these words on my bracelet”
The gentle chinking of these letters being immortalised on these silver bangles, was the affirmation and daily reminder that the wearer is safe, that she is powerful and that she is proud of herself.
Two Languages From The Start | Our Journey into the Welsh Language
Dwy Iaith O’r Dechrau Two Languages From The Start
Tucked away on a residential road in Caldicot, South Wales is a little primary school. It’s what you might call a hidden gem, especially as it lies on a border Wales-England town close to the banks of the River Severn. As it is a place where the children who go there, take part in lessons and playtime through the medium of Welsh.
Ysgol Gymraeg Y Ffin, meaning Welsh School of the Border, was the school we chose to send our daughter to and it will always hold a special place in my heart.
I will admit initially, it was a brave step into an unknown for us, choosing to educate a child in a language neither of us spoke at home. And I won’t deny, it also raised a few eyebrows for some friends and family, asking us why two non-welsh speakers – we’re what you might call life-longer learners – could have made such a choice.
Along the way we’ve faced the questions, such as “how will you help her with homework?” Or statements like “well I think you’re brave, as I’d want to know what my kids are saying about me behind my back!” To answer the first, she’s pretty amazing at translating her school work between two languages when she needs to and to respond to the second, well… don’t they talk about us in any language?
To give some background, we were some part convinced that this was the way to go as she approached pre-school. Mainly due to her father, who was born in Montreal Canada and who went to a French-speaking school for the first few years of his school life. He has maintained his French having not lived there since he was 10 years old. Also I have older nieces, who I’ve watched in amazement as they grew fluent so quickly and are using their Welsh not only across Wales but in other communities across the world. To give the opportunity, a gift of another language for our own child, was an easy decision in the end. She’s now been bilingual since five years old.
However, there is more to the reason than this and this bit is really quite special, as I know that many schools and home-educating communities across the country offer positive learning experiences for children and families alike. So to watch our little girl walk into a school with a deep-routed passion for the Arts and for the Welsh culture certainly helped create the trust and belief we needed. With smaller class numbers and wellbeing right up there with these children’s academic learning experience, it became a journey we embraced rather than the original leap of faith we held. The teachers genuinely know and take pride in all the children and their unique achievements.
This is also a little school where we’ve made the best of friends. Not just people that have grown up living in our community, but people from all over the country and world that have lived elsewhere for years and have now returned to Wales with their own families. Not always Welsh-speaking, there are those who see something familiar and fitting from within their own international culture that links in so well. Quite often Welsh or English aren’t the only languages you’ll hear at the school gate.
The positive effect of seeing these children take care of each other is profound. They are walking, talking voices of reason. I’ve spent time over the years volunteering at this school, enough to see beyond the magic of classroom learning. There’s kindness and respect between these kids which speaks volumes. Whether they openly hug and console on mass, someone who’s fallen on the playground, or the times they’ve spoken up with a zero-tolerate approach to a mean remark to another child they barely know. I also remember with fondness, how she’d come home and talk animately about a tribe of infant kids she’d just become an adopted ‘school mum’ to!
Bore da – good morning
Nos da – good night
Hwyl fawr – goodbye
Diolch yn fawr – thank you
Croeso – welcome
The Welsh word, hiraeth (pronounced hear-rithe) has no direct translation. It’s a bit like the Danish word, hygge, only it’s more a feeling than a way of being. It’s a feeling of nostalgia, a yearning and a sense of longing. Imagine that it’s not necessarily connected to a physical place, but that it can be of a yearning for an era, a person or even somewhere you’ve yet to experience. Your spiritual home.
I’ve experienced the the magic of my daughter becoming bilingual from a young age, I’ve watched her embrace her Welsh culture with friends she’ll have for life wherever she goes in this world. Hiraeth explains the feeling to me well. I have nostalgia for Ysgol Gymraeg Y Ffin and I truly hope that others will get to feel this for years to come.
Featured in the Spring 2020 issue of JUNO Magazine
Photographing Community Stories
Community Connections
There’s a saying that it takes a village to raise a child and I believe that this is the perfect metaphor to link with the communities I’ve been honoured to photograph over the years. Although no two communities are the same there is a common heartbeat, a strong connection that runs across them all. It’s the gathering of people with the purpose of supporting, offering refuge and educating those who want and need them. It is this that continues to draw me in to community storytelling.
It feels right to be seeing out this year’s Natural Connections features in JUNO Magazine with a little more insight and a huge amount of gratitude to some of the amazing groups I’ve been incredibly lucky to observe, connect with and photograph. Gaining deeper understanding of the support they offer and the celebration they give for the many walks of life.
In a time when news stories are mainly negative, often highlighting the vital global issues, disasters arising from climate change and the daily struggles of human plight. These communities really are the unsung heroes. Keeping the hope, opting for action and showing humanity in its best light.
Father-of-four Tariq Khan co-started the group, Help The Homeless Newport & Cardiff around two years ago. Having once been homeless himself, he works with endless energy, thinking up innovative events and ideas, with a group of dedicated volunteers, to continually raise awareness and offer support to Newport’s homeless and vulnerable communities.
Photographing Science Week at a Monmouthshire school
Future astronauts, rocket scientists, engineers and bio-chemists were busy performing death defying, life saving and heart racing experiments across this Welsh language primary school in Monmouthshire, South Wales. For taking part in British Science Week last month.
The energy and enthusiasm around the school was infectious, as I joined in to photograph the children running their different experiments. From exploding Coke bottles that had been detonated with Mentos sweets, through to erupting volcanoes and finding out how our immune systems work.
"I reckon this is exactly what real life astronauts have to learn when they go to school!"
There were intelligent, from-the-heart debates as groups of badgers, hedgehogs, children and construction workers each gave their valid views as to why a main road should or shouldn't be built alongside their village - a truly wonderful roleplaying exercise from a representative of the Gwent Wildlife Trust. The school also experienced extreme weather systems and climate change from a meteorology expert.
It was a week full to the brim, of learning science in the most exciting and dynamic way. But what really touched me, was how these budding astronauts and bio-chemists pulled together and guided their peers through the many activities on offer.
The amazing teachers of this school and the equally amazing scientific volunteers, helped to empower the older children by letting them demonstrate many of the experiments to the younger years. Adorning protective eyewear, clothing and gloves, these kids gave their younger peers a "there's no room for error" and "please stand back for your own safety" drill before each eruption and explosion... I must say that I'd feel in safe hands heading up into Space with these lot!
