Donovan Wylie (born 1971) is an Irish

photographer A photographer (the Greek language, Greek φῶς (''phos''), meaning "light", and γραφή (''graphê''), meaning "drawing, writing", together meaning "drawing with light") is a person who makes photographs. Duties and types of photographe ...

from

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...

, based in Belfast. His work chronicles what he calls "the concept of vision as power in the architecture of contemporary conflict" – prison, army watchtowers and outposts, and listening stations – "merging documentary and art photography". Wylie's work has been exhibited in solo exhibitions at the

Imperial War Museum Imperial War Museums (IWM) is a British national museum organisation with branches at five locations in England, three of which are in London. Founded as the Imperial War Museum in 1917, the museum was intended to record the civil and military ...

and

The Photographers' Gallery The Photographers' Gallery was founded in London by Sue Davies opening on 14 January 1971, as the first public gallery in the United Kingdom devoted solely to photography. It is also home to the Deutsche Börse Photography Prize, established in ...

in London,

National Science and Media Museum The National Science and Media Museum (formerly The National Museum of Photography, Film & Television, 1983–2006 and then the National Media Museum, 2006–2017), located in Bradford, West Yorkshire, is part of the national Science Museum G ...

in Bradford, and

Royal Ontario Museum The Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) is a museum of art, world culture and natural history in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is one of the largest museums in North America and the largest in Canada. It attracts more than one million visitors every year ...

in Toronto; and is held in the collections of the

Centre Georges Pompidou The Centre Pompidou (), more fully the Centre national d'art et de culture Georges-Pompidou ( en, National Georges Pompidou Centre of Art and Culture), also known as the Pompidou Centre in English, is a complex building in the Beaubourg area of ...

in Paris,

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

in New York,

Tate Modern Tate Modern is an art gallery located in London. It houses the United Kingdom's national collection of international modern and contemporary art, and forms part of the Tate group together with Tate Britain, Tate Liverpool and Tate St Ives. It is ...

in London,

Yale University Art Gallery The Yale University Art Gallery (YUAG) is the oldest university art museum in the Western Hemisphere. It houses a major encyclopedic collection of art in several interconnected buildings on the campus of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. ...

Milwaukee Art Museum The Milwaukee Art Museum (MAM) is an art museum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Its collection contains nearly 25,000 works of art. Location and Visit Located on the lakefront of Lake Michigan, the Milwaukee Art Museum is one of the largest art museu ...

National Gallery of Canada The National Gallery of Canada (french: Musée des beaux-arts du Canada), located in the capital city of Ottawa, Ontario, is Canada's national art museum. The museum's building takes up , with of space used for exhibiting art. It is one of the l ...

in Ottawa,

Science Museum Group The Science Museum Group (SMG) consists of five British museums: * The Science Museum in South Kensington, London * The Science and Industry Museum in Manchester * The National Railway Museum in York * The Locomotion Museum (formerly the Natio ...

in the UK,

Ulster Museum The Ulster Museum, located in the Botanic Gardens in Belfast, has around 8,000 square metres (90,000 sq. ft.) of public display space, featuring material from the collections of fine art and applied art, archaeology, ethnography, treasure ...

in Belfast, and

Victoria and Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...

in London. In 2010 he was shortlisted for the

Deutsche Börse Photography Prize Deutsch or Deutsche may refer to: *''Deutsch'' or ''(das) Deutsche'': the German language, in Germany and other places *''Deutsche'': Germans, as a weak masculine, feminine or plural demonym *Deutsch (word), originally referring to the Germanic ve ...

. He was a member of

Magnum Photos Magnum Photos is an international photographic cooperative owned by its photographer-members, with offices in New York City, Paris, London and Tokyo. It was founded in 1947 in Paris by photographers Robert Capa, David Seymour (photographer), Davi ...

from 1998 to 2017. Wylie has also made films – in 2002 he won a British Academy Film Award (BAFTA) for ''The Train,'' a 50 minute documentary written, directed and with cinematography by Wylie.

Career

Wylie was born in 1971 in

Belfast Belfast ( , ; from ga, Béal Feirste , meaning 'mouth of the sand-bank ford') is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan on the east coast. It is the 12th-largest city in the United Kingdo ...

. He started

photography Photography is the art, application, and practice of creating durable images by recording light, either electronically by means of an image sensor, or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film. It is employed ...

in his teens while a pupil at

Belfast Royal Academy The Belfast Royal Academy (commonly shortened to ) is the oldest school in the city of Belfast, Northern Ireland. It is a co-educational, non-denominational voluntary grammar school in north Belfast. The Academy is one of 8 schools in Northern ...

, and at the age of 16 he left school and went on a three-month journey around Ireland. These travels resulted in his first book, ''32 Counties,'' published when he was 18. In 1992, at age 20, Wylie became a nominee of the

agency, then a full member in 1998, and left the organisation in 2017. Since 2000, he has completed various photographic and film projects exploring the religious identity, history, and the concept of territory, especially in

during

The Troubles The Troubles ( ga, Na Trioblóidí) were an ethno-nationalist conflict in Northern Ireland that lasted about 30 years from the late 1960s to 1998. Also known internationally as the Northern Ireland conflict, it is sometimes described as an "i ...

, post-ceasefire. His work has expanded over the years, and concentrates on the "architecture of conflict". His notable works include projects on The Maze Prison in Northern Ireland (2002 and 2007–2008), British

watchtower A watchtower or watch tower is a type of fortification used in many parts of the world. It differs from a regular tower in that its primary use is military and from a turret in that it is usually a freestanding structure. Its main purpose is to ...

s (2005–2006), and the

Green Zone The Green Zone ( ar, المنطقة الخضراء, translit=al-minṭaqah al-ḫaḍrā) is the most common name for the International Zone of Baghdad. It was a area in the Karkh district of central Baghdad, Iraq, that was the governmental ...

Baghdad Baghdad (; ar, بَغْدَاد , ) is the capital of Iraq and the second-largest city in the Arab world after Cairo. It is located on the Tigris near the ruins of the ancient city of Babylon and the Sassanid Persian capital of Ctesiphon ...

(2008). He has also worked in

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

Slovakia Slovakia (; sk, Slovensko ), officially the Slovak Republic ( sk, Slovenská republika, links=no ), is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east, Hungary to the south, Austria to the s ...

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

, and

Yugoslavia Yugoslavia (; sh-Latn-Cyrl, separator=" / ", Jugoslavija, Југославија ; sl, Jugoslavija ; mk, Југославија ;; rup, Iugoslavia; hu, Jugoszlávia; rue, label=Pannonian Rusyn, Югославия, translit=Juhoslavija ...

. ''The Guardians review of Wylie's ''Vision as Power'' exhibition at the Imperial War Museum in London stated: "Merging documentary and art photography, Wylie's images reveal both the impact of surveillance architecture on the natural landscape and the importance of surveillance in modern conflict." Wylie's book ''The Maze'' (2004) is included in Parr and

Badger Badgers are short-legged omnivores in the family Mustelidae (which also includes the otters, wolverines, martens, minks, polecats, weasels, and ferrets). Badgers are a polyphyletic rather than a natural taxonomic grouping, being united b ...

's ''The Photobook: A History, Volume II,'' and his ''Scrapbook'' (2009) is included in ''Volume III.'' In 2013, Wylie was a Doran Artist in Residence at

, a residency that resulted in a body of American work titled ''A Good and Spacious Land.'' An exhibition of the work opened there in June 2017 alongside work by

Jim Goldberg Jim Goldberg (born 1953) is an American artist and photographer, whose work reflects long-term, in-depth collaborations with neglected, ignored, or otherwise outside-the-mainstream populations. Among the many awards Goldberg has received are thr ...

. In 2018/2019, as a response to

Brexit Brexit (; a portmanteau of "British exit") was the withdrawal of the United Kingdom (UK) from the European Union (EU) at 23:00 GMT on 31 January 2020 (00:00 1 February 2020 CET).The UK also left the European Atomic Energy Community (EAEC or ...

, he travelled around the British Isles, photographing lighthouses from neighbouring coastlines.

Publications

Publications by Wylie

*''32 Counties: Photographs of Ireland.'' **London:

Secker & Warburg Harvill Secker is a British publishing company formed in 2005 from the merger of Secker & Warburg and the Harvill Press. History Secker & Warburg Secker & Warburg was formed in 1935 from a takeover of Martin Secker, which was in receivership, ...

, 1989. . **London: Secker & Warburg, 1990. . *''The Dispossessed.'' UK:

Picador A ''picador'' (; pl. ''picadores'') is one of the pair of horse-mounted bullfighters in a Spanish-style bullfight that jab the bull with a lance. They perform in the ''tercio de varas'', which is the first of the three stages in a stylized bullf ...

, 1990. With Robert McLiam Wilson *''Populations in Danger.'' UK: J. Libbey, 1992. *''Ireland: Singular Images.'' London:

André Deutsch André Deutsch (15 November 1917 – 11 April 2000) was a Hungarian-born British publisher who founded an eponymous publishing company in 1951. Biography Deutsch was born on 15 November 1917 in Budapest, Hungary, the son of a Jewish dentis ...

, 1994. . *''Notes from Moscow'' **Transatlantic, 1994. . **UK: Picador, 2004. *''Losing Ground.'' Fourth Estate, 1998. . With an afterword by

Andrew O'Hagan Andrew O'Hagan (born 1968) is a List of Scottish novelists, Scottish novelist and non-fiction author. Three of his novels have been nominated for the Booker Prize and he has won several awards, including the Los Angeles Times Book Award. His m ...

. *''The Maze.'' **London:

Granta ''Granta'' is a literary magazine and publisher in the United Kingdom whose mission centres on its "belief in the power and urgency of the story, both in fiction and non-fiction, and the story’s supreme ability to describe, illuminate and ma ...

, 2004. . **Göttingen:

Steidl Steidl is a German-language publisher, an international publisher of photobooks, and a printing company, based in Göttingen, Germany. It was started in 1968 by Gerhard Steidl and is still run by him. Overview The company was started by Gerha ...

, 2010. . *''British Watchtowers.'' Göttingen: Steidl, 2007. . *''Scrapbook.'' Göttingen: Steidl, 2009. . With Timothy Prus. *''Outposts: Kandahar Province.'' Göttingen: Steidl, 2011. . With an afterword by

Gerry Badger Gerald David "Gerry" Badger (born 1946) is an English writer and curator of photography, and a photographer. In 2018 he received the J Dudley Johnston Award from the Royal Photographic Society. Life and career Badger was born in 1946 in Northam ...

. *''North Warning System.'' Göttingen: Steidl, 2014. .

Publications paired with others

*''A Good and Spacious Land.'' New Haven, CT:

Yale Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wor ...

, 2017. . A two-volume set with

's ''Candy.'' With an introduction by Pamela Franks and essays by Christopher Klatell and Laura Wexler.

Films

*''The Train'' (''Witness,'' episode 25) (2001), written, directed and with cinematography by Wylie –

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned enterprise, state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a four ...

/October Films, 50 minutes, produced by Liana Pomerantsev, Russian with English subtitles. *''YoYo'' (2002) – Channel 4/October Films. *''Jesus Comes To London'' (2003) – Channel 4/October Films. *''The 12th'' (season 1, episode 3) (2003), directed by Wylie – 10 minutes, produced by Fulcrum Waddell Media.

Solo exhibitions

*''The Maze,''

, London, 2004. *''Outposts,''

, Bradford, 2011;

, Toronto, 2012. *''Vision as Power,''

, London, 2013. Photographs from ''The Maze,'' ''British Watchtowers,'' ''Green Zone,'' ''Outposts'' and ''Arctic.''

Awards

*2002: Winner, "New Director – Factual",

British Academy Television Craft Awards The British Academy Television Craft Awards is an accolade presented by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA), a charitable organisation established in 1947, which: "supports, promotes and develops the art forms of the moving imag ...

British Academy of Film and Television Arts British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

(BAFTA), for ''The Train.'' *2002:

Royal Photographic Society The Royal Photographic Society of Great Britain, commonly known as the Royal Photographic Society (RPS), is one of the world's oldest photographic societies. It was founded in London, England, in 1853 as the Photographic Society of London with ...

Vic Odden Award, Bath, UK. *2009: Shortlisted for the

2010. *2010: Bradford Fellowship 2010/11 from

Bradford College Bradford College is a further and higher education college in Bradford, West Yorkshire, England, with approximately 25,000 students. The college offers a range of full and part-time courses from introductory level through to postgraduate l ...

University of Bradford The University of Bradford is a Public university, public research university located in the city of Bradford, West Yorkshire, England. A plate glass university, it received its royal charter in 1966, making it the 40th university to be creat ...

and

, UK to make ''Outposts.''

Collections

, New York City: complete 80-picture edition of ''The Maze.'' *

, London: 5 prints from "British Watchtowers". *

, London: 6 prints *

, Milwaukee, WI: 3 items *Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin *

, Ottawa, Ontario: 4 prints *

, UK: complete set of 42 prints from ''Losing Ground'' *

, Paris: 6 prints *

, BelfastDonovan Wylie (born Belfast, 1971)

. Accessed 24 June 2017

References

External links

Photography Blog article on Wylie
* ttps://web.archive.org/web/20101101163907/http://www.bjp-online.com/british-journal-of-photography/q-and-a/1724937/donovan-wylie-architecture-art-life British Journal of Photography interviewbr>Donovan Wylie talks about his Outposts series of work
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wylie, Donovan Magnum photographers Photographers from Northern Ireland Living people 1971 births