PHOTO:Polly Penrose

Polly Penrose studied graphic design at Camberwell College of Arts in London. She went on to work in fashion styling, and subsequently for the acclaimed fashion photographer Tim Walker. In 2008, she won the London Photographic Association Gold Award for a Nude Series. She has since been shortlisted for the D&AD Next Photographer Award (2015) and the Hellerau Photography Award (2016).

By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Benrubi Gallery Archive

In the project space of Benrubi Gallery is on presentation the exhibition of Polly Penrose. Penrose began taking photographs when she was a teen. She would aim the camera towards herself investigating her emotions, body and identity. This same impetuous became her practice as seen in her highly evocative, whimsical image making. Polly Penrose studied Graphic Design at Camberwell College of Arts in London. She went on to work in Fashion Styling and after that worked for the photographer Tim Walker. She has always taken photographs, but started to take the practice seriously when she entered and won a competition held by the London Photographic Association in 2008. When she began taking photos ten years ago her own self-doubt almost got the better of her. “I always wanted to take photographs but I never did. I did everything before I did photography, I just thought I need to know how to use a camera first of all, so I started photographing myself – wherever I could find, I would shoot”.  Penrose uses her body as her subject interacting with objects such as paper, yoga mats, balloons and other everyday elements. Her face is always obscured and her identity changes, in every picture she becomes an integral part of the landscape or an object. Penrose’s nude self-portraits are as striking as they are atypical, portraying the photographer suspended from a TV stand in an empty bedroom, or perched awkwardly in an archway.  Polly Penrose shoots herself in difficult positions, revealing the weight of expectation on other women.

Info: Benrubi Gallery, 521 West 26th Street, 2nd Floor, New York, Duration: 15/11/18-5/1/19, Days & Hours: Tue-Sat 10:00-18:00, https://benrubigallery.com