Matt Stuart

Matt Stuart is a London based street photographer. He uses a 35mm prime lens when shooting street photographs. What Stuart hopes to achieve when shooting street is to capture unique moments that the viewer knows to be genuine. Nothing is set up, all his street images are candid moments. It the fact that they're candid moments that make them seem unique and genuine to look at. The moment in the photographs are everyday moments that have just been composed into a photograph. Its almost as if the world to Stuart is full of interesting and uninteresting things and he uses photography to pick out the interesting moments.

The use of a 35mm lens on the street means that in order to fill the frame with the subject, you must be close. This adds to the other all viewers experience and creates and image that has the illusion that you could step into, and therefor it is as if the viewer is part of the scene, the perspective from a 35mm lens is one that the human eye can recognise as ordinary. Another aspect that the 35mm adds is the personal connection the photographer has to go to in order to get the shot. Stuart has to be right up close with the subject in order to fill the frame, this also adds to the photographs as you know the photography is part of it, they are right there at street level. If the photos were taken using a telephoto lens there would be an impersonal look to the photos. You wouldn't get the same affect that it is a human perspective and you also don't get the same personal connection between subject and photography.

Matt Stuart shoots photographs in both black and white and colour. When ordering and presenting his images, he does not mix colour with black and white, he will have a colour category and a black and white category. This is important when ordering photographs into a series. If colour and black and white are mixed in the same series it can become confusing. The viewer may think that the images come from two separate photographs and it can create a disconnection to the overall flow of the series.

Here is examples of Matt Stuarts colour work:

These photographs work in colour as the interesting elements in the photographs work because of the relationship between the other colours in the frame. The photographers however would still appear interesting in monochrome but you missing would be the information of the colours working together with each other.

Here is some of Matt Stuarts black and white images:

This series of black and white images work in black and white because black and white photographs have an association with form and that is evident in this series. Certain elements in the frames relate to one and other, for example the form of the London Eye below with the bicycle wheel have a formal connection, this can be identified without the use of colour.