Some pics from a nice little event on Sunday. The old girls reunion picnic, part of the 150th anniversary celebrations at Mayfield School. A great atmosphere as a lovely bunch of ladies reunited and reminisced over pims and a cold meat platter.
Part of a great little shoot for The Freshwater Theatre Company who take interactive drama workshops to schools all over the UK. These shots are from a very noisy and enjoyable half hour session with the reception class at Rushmore Primary School in Clapton, East London. Fantastic fun!
More about Freshwater here: http://www.freshwatertheatre.co.uk
Apprentice shepherd, 14 year old Olly Russell with his neighbour and mentor 84 year old John on his farm in Flintshire, North Wales. Olly who was recently diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes, has his own flock of sheep, drives a Land Rover, manages his dogs, goes to school as well as tirelessly helping John throughout the recent lambing season.
A spread from this months PEI Magazine with a portrait of Sonali De Ryker. It says she could be “the best VC in Europe”. I don’t know anything about that but she was a nice lady and a pleasant change from the usual men in suits.
PEI = Private Equity International, VC = Venture Capitalist(I think)
A recent shoot from my new Diabetes Portraits project with dynamic Dylan on Wimbledon Common who is a 7 year old type 1 diabetic and keen tree climber. For a change from me just picking my favourite shot, (which usually turns out not to be the best one by general consensus) this is my edit election including Dylan with his blood glucose meter and having his insulin injection.
Living with diabetes. There’s no doubt that it’s a hassle and if you want a long happy life like most other people, you will continuously be testing your blood sugar and monitoring your food intake as well as lots of other boring things I won’t go into here. What I’ve been struck by recently though is, how children adapt to it and get on with their lives and the simple fact that it’s not the condition itself but it’s how you manage it and your attitude towards it that is the crucial factor. It’s all about getting on with it and that’s what kids do, but only with the support of their mums of course. So here are a few pics of diabetic kids that I’ve done recently, all of which whom have a tough feisty clever mums, essential for any kid with such an annoyingly complicated condition.
Here we have footballing brothers Ben(9) and Josh(7) Adams, ballet dancer Harriet McLoed(9), 4 year old twins Amelie and Albie Sutton and artist Michael Tilley (13). All getting on with life with Type 1 Diabetes and all with dynamic mums helping them do it.
I’m on the road now travelling all over our damp land in search of dynamic people of all ages and ethnicities that would make interesting and inspiring portraits to show that having diabetes should not hold you back in life. So please give me a shout if you know anyone with diabetes (any age and both types), who would like a fun picture taken of them to go on the Diabetes UK site www.diabetes.org.uk and hopefully inspire others with the condition.
A few shots from my recent visit to the Diabetes Research labs at Kings College School of Medicine. As someone who has diabetes it was particularly interesting, both to see the actual research happening and that headway is being made towards some kind of cure. Most of the research going on was into the blood of the newly diagnosed to gain a full understanding of what is happening to the blood cells at this time and whether any intervention can stop or slow down the process. Fascinating stuff and certainly these studies really are heading in the right direction coming on in leaps and bounds in the last few years. The head researcher there likened the speed of their achievements with what has happened with HIV research and treatment, that is something that was once a death sentence only a few years ago, is now completely treatable and people live long lives with it. However he wouldn’t be pushed on that eureka moment and when it would happen, it seems that tests on humans for anything they come up with are still a long way off. It was a real joy to see it all in action though and by a surprisingly cool bunch of young people while listening to louder than you’d expect, groovy music!