FREELANCE PHOTOGRAPHER IN RESIDENCE
PICTURING ECCLES
CALL OUT FOR EXPRESSION OF INTEREST
ABOUT THE COMMISSION
Open Eye Gallery are working in partnership with Salford City Council to deliver a new photography project with local community members in Eccles, Salford.
The aim of the work is to deliver a programme of photography-focused engagement sessions which has the people of Eccles and the place itself at the heart of the project.
Aims of the programme:
- To devise and deliver a unique photography project that will extend and strengthen the connections people have to Eccles and each other.
- To work in collaboration with local residents, businesses, organisations to develop ideas and content.
- To devise and deliver an imaginative engagement programme with established community groups and open sessions for the general public.
- To produce a body of work in collaboration with the local community that will turn Eccles town centre into a temporary gallery. This could be a pop-up exhibition in one of the empty shop units, using windows in empty units or within Eccles library, existing cafes and local businesses.
- Explore and link to the heritage of Eccles whilst very much looking to the future.
MORE ABOUT THE CONTEXT OF THE COMMISSION
Eccles is an historic market town within the city of Salford which grew up around the 13th century Parish Church and is perhaps best known for the famous Eccles Cake.
Eccles is sandwiched between areas that are growing rapidly. Eccles has a significant role to play in supporting the needs of these surrounding residential communities and as a centre of economic growth and employment in its own right. Eccles has excellent transport links, a strong heritage story, an emerging independent café and retail sector, an active community and voluntary sector and good education provision.
However, Eccles has found recent years hard, particularly in terms of job opportunities, housing that doesn’t meet people’s needs, empty shops in the town centre and an overall lack of investment. All of these things mean fewer people visit the town centre, which all adds to the town looking and feeling empty.
During 2022 Salford City Council asked over 600 people: ‘What does the future of Eccles look like and how do we get there?’ From this has come a new shared Vision that reflects the ambitions of the people who live, work and spend time in Eccles.
Eccles Vision has been inspired by the distinctiveness, unique character and heritage of the town. It highlights what makes it special and the opportunities there are in helping attract investment in buildings and greenspaces, create jobs, build homes and support businesses.
This commission is part of the wider engagement programme and will fulfil the key themes from Eccles Vision. It will celebrate the heritage of the town, whilst looking forward to the future. It will bring people together, helping to build a sense of community and pride. Events that are public and visible will animate the spaces, creating a vibrant town centre.
MORE ABOUT THE COMMISSIONERS
Open Eye Gallery is one of the UK’s leading photography spaces. We present an international programme of contemporary photography exhibitions at our Liverpool Waterfront gallery, elsewhere in the UK, and further afield. We also programme workshops, talks and evening events, and house a permanent archive of diverse photographs. We deliver an on-going socially engaged programme of residencies and collaborative projects between practitioners and our local community. This particular commission opportunity is part of a Young at Art initiative, which is a long term-project working with over 60s across the Liverpool city region to create a new cultural network with an active sense of digital agency. The project is delivered by Open Eye Gallery in partnership with FACT and National Museum’s Liverpool and is funded as part of the £3 million celebrating age scheme by Arts Council England and the Baring Foundation.
Please note as part of this programme Open Eye Gallery has a long standing collaboration with a group of Over 60s residents from Northwood Kirkby (also in the Knowsley Borough). We would like to extend an invitation for this group to meet the new group at Watch Factory at the beginning of the project, to ‘show and tell’ how they have approached their project previously and to potentially connect the two groups longer term.
Salford City Council
Our vision is to make Salford a fairer and more inclusive place where everyone can reach their full potential and live prosperous and fulfilling lives free from poverty and inequality.
The regeneration of town centres is a corporate and political priority for the Council to ensure inclusive growth is realised across the city.
THE ROLE OF THE PHOTOGRAPHER AND WHAT WE ARE LOOKING FOR IN THIS COMMISSION
Open Eye Gallery and Salford City Council are keen to work with the best photographer/s interested in exploring the power of photography with a diverse range of people, developing visual narratives that are meaningful to them.
We recognise that photographers will have established different processes for engaging with communities, which may range from the co-authoring of the projects (including creating work in dialogue with communities), and / or supporting participants in creating photographic stories themselves and supporting the editing process – or a mixture of all of these.
We are interested in photographers who are either living and / or working in Salford or are local to the North West region and have a good understanding of the local area.
We have already identified local groups/ individuals in the area who are likely to want to engage in the programme and can discuss this with interested applicants if helpful. The groups range from primary schools, young people through Salford Youth Service to Age UK Salford. We would also look to involve residents who are ordinarily less likely to engage to ensure all voices are heard throughout the project.
PHOTOGRAPHER’S BRIEF
The Photographer will be expected to:
• Deliver up to 16 ‘delivery’ sessions/ days of work with identified groups/ individuals from the Eccles area. (We would suggest 2 days for planning, 12 days of delivery and 2 days for exhibition prep).
• Attend up to 2 wider artist sharing labs/ coffee morning catch up events (which are monthly and online) during the projects duration to share feedback and peer review of other current projects being delivered within our programme. These are very informal and you are more than welcome to continue attending the sessions beyond the length of your commission if you find this helpful as a longer term support network.
• Work closely with the programme’s Creative Producer and Open Eye Gallery’ Head of Social Practice to confirm and deliver the engagement sessions with identified groups
• To work with the programme’s Creative Producer and Open Eye Gallery’s Head of Social Practice and project participants to discuss the curation, selection and preparation of their work for a physical and digital exhibition (please note this will be within the community setting but has the potential opportunity of touring in a different digital context to Open Eye Gallery at a later date)
- There is an opportunity to be supported by a number of MA socially engaged photography students at the University of Salford on this programme. You are not responsible for the coordination of this but may need to confirm workshop/ engagement details with the Head of Social Practice in advance of the sessions to ensure students are aware on how best to help with the session that day.
- Contribute to the monitoring data and evaluation reporting
- We are also offering an optional opportunity to produce a written reflective blogs/ video interview about the project, for the Open Eye Gallery website, associated Socially Engaged Photography Network (SEPN) and/ or blogs for project partner marketing purposes.
BUDGET
- Artist fee (based on an estimated 16 delivery and exhibition prep sessions / days @ £250 – fixed fee of £4000
- Materials / Kit for workshops and delivery – £700 (Please note we also have access to free camera equipment including compact digital cameras, UV lights for cyanotype printing, tripods, pop up studio backdrops etc)
- Artist travel – £418
- There is an additional budget for participant access costs, marketing and exhibition production (exhibition budget is around £1500), which will be discussed and finalised with the successful candidate
SUBMISSION DETAILS AND SCHEDULE
Deadline for submission of interest by 10am, Monday 21st August 2023
– Please submit up to 2 A4 sides describing why you are interested in the role and potential lines of enquiries / approaches to practice you would like to deliver through this project (please consider the project aims within this proposal) OR if you prefer you can send a video recording of the above.
– A current CV
– Up to 8 images / video links exemplifying your work which you feel is most relevant to this project
– Please complete the Equal Opportunities Form online here: https://forms.gle/2243wgehscs62Phr9
If you need any additional support in pulling application document together or have any questions about this process please feel free to contact our Head of Social Practice at liz@openeye.org.uk
Please submit all applications to jobs@openeye.org.uk
Shortlisted candidates informed: Thursday 7 September.
Interviews will take place the week of 11th September in Eccles.
- Project start date: October 2023 – initial planning meeting with Head of Social Practice, Creative Producer and Salford City Council team.
- Project timeline: Engagement period between November 2023 – February 2024
- Exhibition and Evaluation period in Spring 2024
PLEASE SUBMIT YOUR COMPLETED APPLICATION TO: jobs@openeye.org.uk
As part of our ongoing commitment to supporting the development and championing of socially engaged photography practice, we can provide feedback on applications if unsuccessful via email on request.