Carmen and Alec Soth – Brighton Picture Hunt

by fashionartbooks

At the end of 2010, the Brighton Photo Biennial commissioned three artists to produce work around the UK seaside towns of Brighton and Hove. One of the selected artists was acclaimed US photographer Alec Soth who flew over only to be refused a permit to work. To work around this, Soth’s daughter Carmen who was travelling with him became the photographer. Each day they would make a wishlist of things they would like to take a picture of and then they would set out, walking around Brighton for a few hours each day to try and capture these images. This project is a unique take on the traditional photography essay; by making his daughter the photographer, images are captured from a unique perspective, “I’d give anything to be able to see the world with such open eyes. Her visual vocabulary isn’t cluttered with all of the cliches and references that mine is…..They show this city from a child’s perspective which has as much validity as if a professional had made the pictures”. The resulting book Brighton Picture Hunt, published by Photoworks, was produced in an edition of 1000 copies, a small number of which were signed. The book is still available from the Photoworks website, as is a limited edition print from the project.