Focussing on London’s Global Finance Centre – The Square Mile – ‘Suit Up’ aims to question photography’s competence as a communicative tool. The Square Mile is a self-contained ceremonial county at the heart of Greater London.
To those who wish to see it, the images in this series have the potential to communicate numerous stories and meanings about the City and its inhabitants, culture and lifestyle. However, there is no narrative or message- orientated agenda behind these images: all context, captions, deliberate editing and supplementary material – typically used to guide the viewer to a finite perspective – have been set aside.
We are consequently left with a blank canvas; a medium that communicates nothing beyond the superficial. These photographs, alike all photography, are unmatched in their meticulous ability to describe form, but were not captured with an inherent meaning already attached. They are mute: subjectively framed and disconnected from the flow of time.
With only our external knowledge to interpret these pictures, the tales that can be appropriated from the series are contradictory. Themes of authority, conformity, prosperity, reserve, melancholy and audacity seem to resonate simultaneously: all could be accurate or false. Similarly, the relationships, movements and postures that seem visible in each image can be speculated – this is simply who, where and how these elements were framed at each precise moment. They are viewed together within the image, yet they likely have little association.
Photographs can present no concise explanation alone; only that which is assumed of them. This is the mediums’ raw, unembellished nature.
Craig Simmonds was born in 1994. He lives and works in West Sussex, England as a Marketing and Editorial Officer. In 2015 he graduated from The University of Gloucestershire. During his studies, Simmonds has worked as an Events Photographer for his local town press, and has assisted in shoots for national publications such as The Daily Mail.
