Look Photo Biennial (stylised as LOOK Photo Biennial) is a biannual photography festival based in

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a populat ...

, UK. It is a four-week programme that takes place in various venues in Liverpool and across the

North West The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each sepa ...

in April and May. It dates back to 2007 but began in its current format in 2011. From 2018 it is being led by

Open Eye Gallery Open Eye Gallery is a photography gallery and archive in Liverpool, UK that was established in 1977. It is housed in a purpose-built building on the waterfront at Mann Island, its fourth location. Open Eye Gallery comprises an exhibition space ...

, where the festival is centred. Prior to 2018 it was called Look - Liverpool International Photography Festival. It runs in the opposing years to

Liverpool Biennial Liverpool Biennial is the largest international contemporary art festival in the United Kingdom. Every two years, the city of Liverpool hosts an extensive range of artworks, projects, and a programme of events. The biennial commissions leading ...

Focus and activities

The Look website states "LOOK Photo Biennial is about how we see the world through lenses, screens, culture, contexts. ... We want to think about how we can overcome our visual reflexes, and see the drastic changes taking place right now in the UK and across the globe through fresh eyes." The festival includes archive work, recent work and newly commissioned work by emerging and established artists from Liverpool, the UK and elsewhere. The majority of work is new or being shown in the UK for the first time. The festival takes place over four weeks and includes exhibitions, conferences, talks, tours, workshops, participation activities, screenings, competitions and fringe activities.

History

The Look - Liverpool International Photography Festival "launched in 2011 as a response to a series of events initiated by Manchester-based photography network Redeye in 2007 (Look07)." From 2018 it is being led by

Biennials

2011 – LOOK/11

The artistic director was

Stephen Snoddy Stephen Snoddy (born 1959) is a British artist and gallery director. Career Snoddy trained as a painter at Belfast College of Art where he graduated in 1983 with an MA in Fine Art. Snoddy moved to Manchester in 1986 and graduated with a Post ...

. It included work by

Edward Burtynsky Edward Burtynsky (born February 22, 1955) is a Canadian photographer and artist known for his large format photographs of industrial landscapes. His works depict locations from around the world that represent the increasing development of indust ...

Homer Sykes Homer Warwick Sykes (born 1949) is a Canadian-born British documentary photographer whose career has included personal projects and landscape photography. Early life and education Sykes's father, Homer Warwick Sykes, was a Canadian-born American ...

, John Davies, Donovan Wylie,

Robert Polidori Robert Polidori (born February 10, 1951) is a Canadian-American photographer known for his large-scale color images of architecture, urban environments and interiors. His work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of ...

and

Mitch Epstein Mitchell Epstein (born 1952) is an American fine-art photographer, among the first to make significant use of color. His books include ''Property Rights'' (2021), ''In India'' (2021), ''Sunshine Hotel'' (2019), ''Rocks and Clouds'' (2018), ''Ne ...

. Venues included

Walker Art Gallery The Walker Art Gallery is an art gallery in Liverpool, which houses one of the largest art collections in England outside London. It is part of the National Museums Liverpool group. History of the Gallery The Walker Art Gallery's collection ...

International Slavery Museum The International Slavery Museum is a museum located in Liverpool, England that focuses on the history and legacy of the transatlantic slave trade. The museum which forms part of the Merseyside Maritime Museum, consists of three main gallerie ...

Liverpool Hope University , mottoeng=Hope to all who need it , established=1844 – Saint Katharine's College (as Warrington Training College)1856 – Notre Dame College (as Our Lady's Training College)1964 – Christ's College1979 – Liverpool Institute of Higher Edu ...

and Open Eye Gallery.

2013 – LOOK/13

The theme was "Who do you think you are?". The director was Patrick Henry. It included work by

Barbara Kruger Barbara Kruger (born January 26, 1945) is an American conceptual artist and collagist associated with the Pictures Generation. She is most known for her collage style that consists of black-and-white photographs, overlaid with declarative captio ...

, Martin Parr, Rankin, August Sander,

Weegee Arthur (Usher) Fellig (June 12, 1899 – December 26, 1968), known by his pseudonym Weegee, was a photographer and photojournalist, known for his stark black and white street photography in New York City. Weegee worked in Manhattan's Lower Eas ...

, Tom Wood and an exhibition curated by Imogen Stidworthy. Venues included Open Eye Gallery,

Bluecoat Chambers Built in 1716–17 as a charity school, Bluecoat Chambers in School Lane is the oldest surviving building in central Liverpool, England. Following the Liverpool Blue Coat School's move to another site in 1906, the building was rented from 1907 ...

and The Cornerhouse Gallery at Liverpool Hope University,

Tate Liverpool Tate Liverpool is an art gallery and museum in Liverpool, Merseyside, England, and part of Tate, along with Tate St Ives, Cornwall, Tate Britain, London, and Tate Modern, London. The museum was an initiative of the Merseyside Development C ...

Foundation for Art and Creative Technology FACT Liverpool is a new media arts centre in Liverpool, England. The building houses galleries, a cinema operated by Picturehouse Cinemas, Picturehouse, a bar and a café. History FACT was established as an organisation focussed on video and n ...

, Liverpool John Moores University Exhibition Research Centre,

Victoria Gallery & Museum The Victoria Gallery & Museum (VG&M) is an art gallery and museum run by the University of Liverpool in Liverpool, Merseyside, England.

2015 – LOOK/15

It was held at various venues including Bluecoat Chambers and Open Eye Gallery.

2017 – LOOK/17

It was curated by Ying Kwok. The theme was "Cities of Exchange" and incorporated

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...

as an exchange city. It included work by Wong Wo Bik.

References

External links

*{{Official website, openeye.org.uk/look/
"LOOK/13: Liverpool's International Photography Festival, 2013"
– gallery at ''The Daily Telegraph Art biennials Art festivals in the United Kingdom British biennial events Photography festivals