Capturing the captured of Guantanamo

by Lauren Cowley

Edmund Clark is a photographer whose work has included photographs of Guantanamo Bay and young offenders in Britain.

He studied a postgraduate degree at the London College of Printing [now Communication] and has since pursued a highly successful career.

Despite not picking up a camera until his late twenties, he has been awarded various prestigious accolades, including the Best Photography Book Award at the New York Photo Awards 2011.

From looking at his vast portfolio of work, it would be easy to assume that Clark grew up with big dreams about life as a photographer, but it was not until later in life that he really started to engage with the medium:

“I was working in Brussels, conducting surveys for a big advertising company,” he recalls. “My girlfriend at the time had a camera, I’d never had a proper one so I started playing around.

“Photography implies a stillness, so if someone stops and spends time with a photograph perhaps they’re looking at it in a different way than they might have done had they been passing it,” explains Clark, before going on to talk about his acclaimed book Still Life Killing Time, which documents the lifes of detainees and the complex space of Guantanamo Bay where they were held.

“I wanted to look at the nature of space, the politics of space in a prison, how looking at spaces of confinement can tell you about the experiences people have had without them actually being in the picture,” he says emphatically.

Guantanamo

His next project, which continues the study of Guantanamo, seamlessly grew out of the previous work: “I found myself wanting to look at spaces where ex-detainees were living, using the language of personal space and personal possessions,” he explains.

The resulting project, entitled If The Light Goes Out, continues Clark’s startling documentary photography by capturing not only the institutional spaces of the naval base, but also the later lives and psychological effects suffered by the detainees that spent long periods of time there.

Clark recognises that his parents saturated his childhood with creativity, especially his father, who he feels has influenced his artistic life hugely:

“My father ended up being a painter so there was quite a lot of imagery around when I was a child. He collected as well – drawings and prints – and as part of my degree from the University of Sussex, I studied History of Art. So I did have quite a visual background.”

Despite this, Clark is quick to reiterate that he had no great plan of becoming an artist from early on. “As a child I wanted to be a footballer. When I was at university I wanted to be an academic. After that I really didn’t know what I wanted to do. It was not a conscious thing that I was going to go to college and become a photographer.

"I was actually looking for work in Brussels as a translator when I came across someone at a student fair who was a tutor at the London College of Printing, as it was called at the time."

Looking through a camera lens

With awards and two books under his belt, it seems that there are still some places he has not been allowed to photograph, despite desperately wishing to.

First on his list? “A rehabilitation centre for ex-detainees and people who’ve been radicalised in Saudi Arabia,” he says without hesitation. “I would like so very much to work on that subject but they just won’t let me.”

With his unerring knack of keenly revealing aspects of spaces that others would rather conceal, it can be of no real surprise to any admirer of his work that authority figures often deny him access to locations.

When asked how looking through a camera lens differs from viewing something purely with your eyes, Clark offers up the notion: “If people are prepared to spend time with a body of work they might react to it a little more intuitively, making it less of an immediate image response.”

Clark goes on to comment on the overwhelming new trend towards citizen journalism. Which, for the record, he is not afraid of despite the potential risks it poses to more traditional photography. “You’re getting imagery that is absolutely of the moment, taken by people directly involved, which is immensely powerful,” he explains.

“In that way the witness photographer or the objective photographer isn’t quite so complicit.”

Talking about routes into photography, Clark mentions men like W. Eugene Smith and Eugene Richards, who both paved his way into photojournalism. He explains that a large part of what interested him in the medium of pictures in the first place, is that they serve as “another way of looking at the world and engaging with what’s going on”.

Political commentary

Due to this core belief, it is interesting to note how his exhibitions serve as a political commentary, tied to current affairs, that explore how spaces can represent so much of the person that has lived in or is living within them.

“I’m always keeping an eye open for things which could be interesting. The nature of the subjects I get involved with are quite difficult to access so it’s quite frustrating because you spend so much time trying to get access to places and often it gets refused.

"So you have to keep that process going while simultaneously looking for ideas that are different, so you’re creating new challenges, ensuring you’re not just doing the same thing again and again.”

Acknowledging the awards he has received for his work, from exploring the lives of British young offenders to looking at the infamous Guantanamo Bay, Clark quietly notes how important it is to receive credit for one’s own work: “It gives other people a sense of progression and development to your career. Awards are often more important in other people’s eyes than they are in your own,” he says.

“It’s very hard being an independent artist because you have no real support or structure around you. You don’t have the framework that people who work in companies have.” He pauses, before concluding thoughtfully: “You’re only ever as good as the last thing you’ve done.”

To find out more about Edmund Clark’s projects and to view more of his photography visit his website: www.edmundclark.com