In conversation with photographer Ken Grant

Ken Grant is a leading light in documentary photography.

His photographs are held in important collections of photography, including those of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Folkwang Museum Essen,  the Martin Parr Foundation and other international public and private collections. A substantial overview of his work is held by the Hyman Collection of British Photography.

His series of photographs, The Close Season, are included in the exhibition  Island Life: Photographs from the Martin Parr Foundation . This show tracks documentary photography from the Mass Observation project in the 1930s to the present day, as collected by Martin Parr CBE.

‘The Close Season is about the moment when work stops or leisure stops, or football is finished for the summer and the men migrate back to the domestic situation and back to the place they don’t feel that part of – slightly exiled from.’

Ken Grant was born in Liverpool. At 12 years old, he was photographing the cabinet-makers in his father’s workshop on Merseyside. He worked as a carpenter himself, before studying photography and later becoming a lecturer in Photography at Belfast School of Art . In his work he has photographed Liverpool and farther afield, capturing the traditions of working class life. His method is to return to communities he has grown to know.

Ken describes Raymond Carver and Gil Scott Heron as influences. Like Grant’s, their work looks at the role of traditional masculinity in the domestic sphere.

In his online talk, Ken will discuss his work, including The Close Season.

How to take part

This free, online talk will be held over Zoom. Please book your place below. Details of how to join the session will be in your registration email. Please check your spam folder if the email does not arrive. Bookings close at 2pm on Thursday 9 September.

Although this talk is free, we would be grateful if you could consider making a donation.

Please visit the Zoom website for guidance on joining meetings. Please allow extra time before the talk begins to make sure everything is working correctly. It’s up to you whether you turn on your video but all guests will be muted once the talk begins. You are welcome to ask questions in the chat box throughout the talk.

This event is part of the programe for Bristol Photo Festival.