‘Not knowing anything about the figure is an important part of the photo’: Gerry McCulloch’s best phone picture
In the Turbine Hall at Tate Modern in London, Gerry McCulloch and his wife, Kaori, were buying tickets for a Yayoi Kusama exhibition. “I happened to turn around and catch a glimpse of this unidentifiable figure,” he says. “Among thousands of visitors from around the globe, it tickled me that this humble story was playing out silently in an unnoticed corner.”
As well as being a photographer, McCulloch is a visual storytelling coach, and in his own creative practice his mantra is “identify, clarify, simplify, amplify”. This image, he says, demonstrates each of these components. The opaque quality of the window helps exclude extraneous elements and draws the viewer in to what he calls “the mystery of the moment”.
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McCulloch says that optimising his photos is never about making them “more interesting by applying filters or overcooking the recipe. Rather it’s about remaining true to the sincerity of the feeling I experienced when I took it. Without transmitting that honesty, how could others be moved by my picture?”
The person behind the glass remains anonymous, even to McCulloch. “Not knowing anything about the figure is an important part of the photo,” he says. “They remain an unspoken story in the fabric of our everyday surroundings.”
