Diolch am ddod – Thank you for coming

Diolch am ddod to all who came to #diffusion2019 – Cardiff’s International Festival of Photography over April this year. I am truly proud to have been a part of it, to have shown GLEAN made in collaboration with Dai Howell as part of ’As We See It’ with PHRAME Collective, but also to exhibit along side so many talented, passionate and generous souls – friends old and new – across South Wales this Spring.

Curated by Celia Jackson & Lisa Edgar, the artists involved with ‘As We See It’ were:
Lorna Cabble – Kate Mercer & Dai Howell – Ayesha Khan – Tess Seymour – Faye Lavery-Griffiths – Tracey Paddison – Savanna DumelowFaye Chamberlain – Megan Winstone – Sarah Hayton – Molly Caenwyn – Jane Nesbitt

The launch of PHRAME itself was a huge success and was quite possibly one of the busiest openings of the entire festival, bringing together friends, colleagues, well wishers as well as industry figures from across Wales to join the celebration. Celia Jackson and David Drake gave speeches about the importance of empowering people and creating opportunities for people to share and create work in Wales. Covering a huge scope of practice and process in photography (spanning from story telling to materiality of photographs as a medium) what shone through on the night was the inclusivity and curiosity of members’ passion for documenting and interrogating the world around us. It was an impressive starting point from which to build PHRAME, and I’m certain that as more news, events and opportunities develop from this collective, we will be sharing and inviting as many people as possible to be involved with them as possible.

A huge diolch a llongyfarchiadau (thank you and congratulations) has to go out to the whole Ffotogallery team – their army of staff, interns and volunteers – whose months of hard work made Diffusion the success it deserved to be, as well as for giving PHRAME and all artists involved the opportunity, support and encouragement to exhibit during the festival this year. Without their passion, committement and determination, Diffusion would not have been possible!

Huge shout out too to The Gate Art & Community Centre (Roath, Cardiff) for being such fab hosts, both leading up to and during Diffusion. ‬Without venues like The Gate, the artscene in Wales would become prescriptive and nonaccesible – they open up the accesibility and coversation around the arts and allow people to show their work and develop their practice – they are a key componant of any creative ecology… get out and spport your independant art venues – it means so much!

If you didn’t see the show in April… CUTLVR have made rather wonderful 360 immersive VR tours of EVERY exhibition as part of Diffusion festival to revisit online… Go to >> https://www.cultvr.cymru/diffusion-festival-2019-the-gate/ << to see this exhibition as well as many more from across Wales.

TTFN x