Kirsten Cooke
Kirsten Cooke
It takes only one look at the pictures adorning the walls of Yeovil photographer Kirsten Cooke’s home to tell you that she has an uncommon approach to her art. Not only are the subjects themselves diverse, but her style often varies between the different types of photographs she takes, or the recording medium she uses. In fact, the camera itself is only one part of Kirsten’s story. “I was a fine artist before I was a photographer. I approach everything from an artistic base, rather than a technical one,” explains Kirsten, who was educated in Somerset before going on to Goldsmiths to study for her degree. “I was there at a time when technology was very basic and we played around with translating photographs onto silk screens and printing fabric from them. So I started using my camera as an extension of myself, like a pencil or a paintbrush. I have always viewed my camera as a tool and a means to an end, rather than just something that produces images.”
Kirsten returned to college to improve her darkroom skills. She has a particular fascination with photographing people within their environment and, by the second year of the five-year course, which led to her becoming an Associate of the Royal Photographic Society, found that her skills were in such demand that photography soon became her career.
The eclectic mix of artists whose work she admires helps to explain Kirsten’s broad-ranging approach to her own work. The photographers among them have mainly come to the medium from an art base, rather than a technical one. Her list includes photographers like Roger Fenton and Cecil Beaton, perhaps noted for a formality of style and attention to detail in black and white portraiture, as well as painters and sculptors, ranging from Caravaggio, Rembrandt and Vermeer, to Kandinsky, Moore and Hepworth.
Although she will sometimes use a digital camera, by far the majority of Kirsten’s photographic work is done with film, involving her in the darkroom processes which she enjoys. The choice of medium she uses, either colour or black and white film, often has quite a bearing on her finished work, too. Her black and white photography often has a measured, classical quality. If taking a portrait, for instance, she might spend much time talking to the subject, paying meticulous attention to the details of the surroundings, before pressing the shutter and getting her shot, just as the photographers she admires might have done. “When I take portraits, I like them to tell a story and make a statement about the person at that point in time,” says Kirsten. Her approach to colour photography, on the other hand, often produces results which are more abstract, more modernist, in nature. She admits to being more purist about black and white photography than about colour . “With colour, I like to allow myself time to let my mind wander and to push the boundaries.”
As well as exhibiting a couple of times each year and lecturing to other photographers around the country, Kirsten teaches photography part-time at Yeovil College and has recently taken a year out to complete her MA in Fine Art. “It was very exciting and gave me the opportunity for self-exploration, to translate ideas and to take my photography to another level,” enthuses Kirsten.
I have a BA hons fine art from Goldsmiths College, London. I am an ARPS Associate Royal Photographic Society and have recently completed a MA in Fine Art/Photography from the Arts Institute Bournemouth. I am currently working towards a PHD.
I regularly exhibit in both Somerset and Dorset Arts weeks. with Exhibitions in Taunton, Gillingham and Yeovil
I belong to SCA and exhibit regularly within this contemporary group of Artist.
