The Artist
Manchester
born on 27th January 1931, Sefton Samuels is a distinguished local
photographer who has lived much of his life in the Didsbury area
and now resides in Altrincham. He was educated at the Manchester
Grammar School and still retains close ties as an Old Manc.
Although Sefton
was a qualified textile technologist, his love of photography
lead him to become a freelance photographer for various national
and local companies. For 5 years he was the main photographer
in the North West for BBC Television. At this time he also set
up his own Photo Library specialising in all aspects connected
with the North West as well as a comprehensive range of general
subjects.
His one man
show of 120 jazz pictures was seen at the Barbican Centre and
he has contributed to several exhibitions at the National Portrait
Gallery where his photographs of George Best and L S Lowry have
been reproduced as postcards. In addition BBC TV has featured
his exhibition of famous classical and jazz musicians as part
of the Olympic Arts Festival at the Royal Northern College of
Music.
Recently,
however, he has concentrated on photographing some of the notable
Old Boys of Manchester Grammar for the school. Over the years
Sefton has photographed many nationally celebrated figures, with
actors, artists, scientists and politicians numbering themselves
amongst his models. These have included L S Lowry, Harold Wilson,
Sir John Barbirolli, and Sir Ben Kingsley. Most recently he has
made portraits of Sir Alex Ferguson and Kevin Keegan.
His work has
been shown at top venues and he has competed to have work shown
in major photographic exhibitions in the UK and worldwide. These
have included the Royal Photographic Society International Print
Exhibition in 2002 and 2003 as well as in the MILK Exhibition
in New York, London & Europe, where he was one of only fifteen
UK-based photographers to be selected from 17000 photographers
from 164 countries and over 40000 images.
He has also
been awarded 3 prizes won in Fuji/BAPLA photographic competition
and his Stock Photos are used regularly by BBC, ITN, LWT and Granada
Television. He
is a member of the Distinctions Panel of the Royal Photographic
Society for Documentary and Visual Journalism submissions.
Collections
of his work can be found at the Victoria & Albert Museum who
hold 10 photographs for their National Collection of the Art of
Photography, and the National Portrait Gallery, who have 67 of
his photographs of famous British people.
His work has
appeared in numerous publications including the British Journal
of Photography Magazine and Annual, the Photography Year Book,
The Guardian, The Telegraph,
The Independent and The Times newspapers.
More information
and his portfolio of photographs can be seen at Sefton's website
at: www.seftonphoto.co.uk
Email: sefton@seftonphoto.co.uk
