Out of the Shadows: Portraits by the Douglas Brothers

Small display at the National Portrait Gallery of photographs by the Douglas Brothers.

I must admit I was more interested in the story of how these pictures were rescued from a warehouse which was being demolished where they had been stored following the brother’s partnership being dissolved. I liked the way they were hung with no labels which made you look at the technique first not who the people were. There was then a useful handout to go to see who the people were if you’d not worked it out.

I found the pictures too dark and misty as they were taken with long exposures which “embraced movement and blur”. I prefer sharper work. However they showed an interesting group of the emerging actors, writer and musicians of the mid-1990s. I loved the pictures of Kenneth Branagh and Tilda Swinton.

Closes on 28 January 2017

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