Instagram Takeover: James Arthur Allen

We welcome this week's Instagram takeover James Arthur Allen. His work focuses strongly on social issues, from the geopolitics and conflicts of the South Caucuses to documenting the hinterlands around his home in Bath.

Allen graduated from University College Falmouth in 2012 with a First Class Honours degree in Press and Editorial Photography, before completing his Masters in Documentary Photography at the University of South Wales in 2018.

 

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Morning everyone @jamesarthurallen here. Thank you all so much for your likes and for engaging with my work this week. More succinct edits and stories can be found on my insta profile as well as my website, A big thanks to @alexandralethbridge & @shoair_m for inviting me to share. This image is of one of the many large “Batches” in Somerset, these mounds dominate the landscape and are one of the only physical traces left of the regions coal mining history. In the mean time I hope you all stay safe and well and may see some of you on the other side. Cheers J • Paulton Batch, Paulton, 2019. #photoworks_uk #jamesarthurallen #instagramtakeover #photography #5×4 #intrepidcamera #analog #landscape #garden #largeformat #kodak #portra #hardlands #hinterlands

A post shared by Photoworks (@photoworks_uk) on Apr 19, 2020 at 12:35am PDT

 

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Morning @jamesarthurallen here, a change of project now, please check out my website (link in my bio) for the wider narrative of Sulis, always hard to bring long form stories across on the the gram and in small edits. Hard Lands is a working title and centres around North Somerset and is the body of work I am currently spending the most time on. Hard Lands aims to explore the post-industrial landscape of North Somerset and the people that reside there. I’m married into a family from the area which is surrounded by quarries and disused mines. My father in-law is a quarryman and has been all is life. Having grown up in London before moving to the west country I have always felt to a point like an outsider here and I’ve been intrigued by the culture and communities that are specific to the region, it’s my way of exploring my Children’s roots. • Westdown Quarry, Chantry, 2019 #photoworks_uk #jamesarthurallen #instagramtakeover #photography #5×4 #intrepidcamera #analog #landscape #largeformat #kodak #portra #hardlands #hinterlands

A post shared by Photoworks (@photoworks_uk) on Apr 17, 2020 at 2:19am PDT

As well as working on personal projects and commissions, Allen lectures part time on the BA Photography courses at Bath Spa and Portsmouth Universities.

 

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Afternoon @jamesarthurallen here. This landscape again is from my work in North Somerset, it was taken at Dairy House Farm a rural hostel for people made homeless in the area, in return for board people work on the farm and build relationships with volunteers and the land whilst they await housing. A good place run by good people. • Dairy House Farm, Stratton on the Fosse, 2019. #photoworks_uk #jamesarthurallen #instagramtakeover #photography #5×4 #intrepidcamera #analog #landscape #garden #largeformat #kodak #portra #hardlands #hinterlands

A post shared by Photoworks (@photoworks_uk) on Apr 18, 2020 at 4:10am PDT

 

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Morning everyone, @jamesarthurallen here, over the next few days I will be sharing work from my project “Sulis”. The project was made over a period of two years after the birth of my Daughter in late 2016. After her arrival I felt a real urge to connect again with my new family and home after making the majority of my work abroad. The images in this body of work are all made within a five mile radius of my home in Bath and explore the hinterlands of the city and the layers of history, religion, folklore and memory that exists there. (Bits and bobs blocked out to keep the gram happy). . Kitty and Edgar, Warleigh, Bath, 2018. “The City of Bath was built on the Roman temple complex of Aquae Sulis. Founded in 60 AD on the site of a sacred hot spring and Celtic shrine to the Mother Goddess Sulis, an ancient deity that brought fertility, life, fortune and vengeance.” #photoworks_uk #jamesarthurallen #instagramtakeover #photography #portrait #portra #kodak #mamiya #analog #sulis #hinterlands

A post shared by Photoworks (@photoworks_uk) on Apr 14, 2020 at 3:05am PDT

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