Street Photography -Shuffell Round 2

The second round of our Shuffell Trophy competition to find our “photographer of the year” will be on 23rd January 2014 (deadline for PDI’s files & print titles is the Sunday before!)

Several questions have already arisen about Street Photography and these few notes may help clarify what it is and how we hope the judge will interpret it.  Although today Street Photography is interpreted as a social record of human interaction within a street environment, we know it can be rather difficult to get such “candid” shots.  For this reason – and as this will be the first time we’ve ventured into this area – we will be using a broader definition that includes architecture and general street scenes which do not require any candid shooting.  You can therefore broaden your interpretation if you would prefer.

This wider definition was in fact where Street Photography began in the 1890’s (see Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Street_photography) with Eugene Atget – the father of the genre – helping to promote Paris streets as a worthy subject for photography.  His subjects consisted mainly of architecture; stairs, gardens, and windows.  He did photograph some workers but it is clear at that time people were not his main focus.  Street Photography has since developed as a distinct genre with Henri Cartier-Bresson – one of its best known masters – using his shiny 35mm Leica (camouflaged with black tape) to capture the actions of people at the ideal moment during the 1930’s.

Wishing you a Happy Christmas and best wishes for 2014