THE PHOTOGRAPHER’S GRIMOIRE

Occult Strategies for Visionary Photographers

“Edward is the most single minded photographer. He probably thinks about photography all the time, like a trainspotter, but a photographer.

He’d take a photograph whilst falling out of a moving vehicle.”

Germaine Greer

A man in a black coat stands on a rocky beach, taking a photo with his camera of the calm ocean and sky at dusk or dawn.

Edward Thompson (B. 1980, Wales) is a British documentary photographer. His photographic work has focused on various subjects over the years covering environmental issues, socio-political movements, subcultures, everyday life and the consequences of war.

He had a life changing experience with an early apprenticeship with the Russian photographer Sergey Chilikov, whom he met at the Arles Photography Festival in 2001. That summer Ed stayed with Sergey in Paris and learnt the value of shooting everyday life, eating fried fat and drinking red wine. Sergeys friend Gueorgui Pinkhassov told him how photographing the everyday can allow you to touch at something great. And it did.

For the visionary photographer who stumbles into sorcery or the sorcerer who stumbles into visionary photography 

Since then his documentary photo-essays have been published in international magazines including National Geographic Magazine, The Guardian Weekend Magazine, BBC, CNN and The Sunday Times Magazine.

His work has been exhibited at The Saatchi Gallery, Christies, Somerset House and Four Corners Gallery (London) and shown as part of photography festivals in Arles (France), Tampere (Finland), Spain (Barcelona), Zingst (Germany) & London (U.K)

He has lectured on photography at The V&A Museum, The Photographers Gallery, The Bishopsgate Institute, L.C.C, The University of Falmouth, The University of Northampton and at the University of East London. He’s spoken regularly about photography on television, radio and online, including on Al Jazeera News and the BBC World Service.