I Have Been Awarded SILVER in the AOP Photography Awards 2020

I still have no words to describe how honoured I am to have been awarded Silver in the AOP Photography Awards 2020 in the Fashion and Beauty category. The category was judged by Nick Knight – Photographer, Director and Founder of SHOWStudios. The AOP Awards are a celebration of the best from image-makers working professionally in the commercial, fine art and creative sectors.

The awarded image was part of my series Spring Cleaning. It depicts a juxtaposition of fashionable and extremely ordinary. I've been interested in the influencer culture for some time now, and how they present their lives as being above the ordinary. Behind all those glamorous images on their social media, influencers are just regular people like the rest of us. But we perceive their lives as aspirational and unattainable, and that has a toll on our self-image and our mental health.

The creative team that worked with me on this shoot were stylist Patricia Machado Medici, hair and makeup artist Rachel Williamson and model Tamara Long from Models1. The winning image is as much mine as it is theirs.

Back in April, I was interviewed by The Trampery when I learnt that I had been selected as a finalist in this category. You can watch the interview on this link.

The awarded images were featured by The Guardian who called us head-spinning talent. Read the feature here.

The results of the competition have also been featured by BBC news on their website where they said that they found the images striking. You can see the feature on this link.

The Association of Photographers - AOP - is the leading body representing photographers in the UK. They have been running the AOP Awards for almost 15 years.

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"Spring Cleaning" Is A Finalist!

I am happy to announce that my image “Spring Cleaning” has been selected as a finalist for this year’s AOP Awards in the Fashion Category. The AOP Awards is run by the Association of Photographers and it has been running for 14 years, each year attracting entries from around the world. The Fashion Category was curated by photographer Nick Knight, Founder and Director at SHOWstudio.

This image is part of a fashion editorial in which I collaborated with stylist Patricia Machado Medici, Hair Stylist - MUA Rachel Williamson, and model Tamara Long, from Models1. The shoot took place at The Trampery Republic.

The 2020 AOP Awards exhibition will take place at One Canada Square, Canary Wharf, in the main public lobby of the building. The exhibition will be open to the public from 14th September until 13 November 2020.

Things to look forward to for when the lockdown is over! Save the date and wish me luck!

Do you like what you just read? Consider becoming a patron on patreon.com/jccandanedo where you can learn more about my creative process and the stories behind my images. I’d love to have you as part of my Patreon community.

You can also subscribe to my weekly blog posts here!

Exhibition at One Canada Square

From the 15th of April to the 31st of May, the AOP (Association of Photographers) will take over the main foyer of One Canada Square in Canary Wharf where over 250 finalist images of the AOP Awards 2019 will be exhibited for a period of seven weeks, including my image "Warrior" from the Distressed series. The exhibition is open to the public and entry is free of charge.

Every Thursday members of AOP staff will lead a tour of the exhibition, commencing at 4pm. No booking necessary, just turn up. Meeting place by Wall 5.

The AOP was formed in 1968 and is one of the most prestigious professional photographers’ associations in the world.

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"The Warrior" Is A Finalist!

I am happy to announce that my image “The Warrior” has been selected as a finalist for this year’s AOP Open Awards stills category. The AOP Open Awards is run by the Association of Photographers and it has been running for 13 years, each year attracting approximately 1500 entries from around the world. The image will be exhibited in April alongside the rest of the finalists and will be included in The Awards Book 2019.

The 2019 AOP Awards exhibition will take place at One Canada Square, Canary Wharf, tor 7 weeks in the main public lobby of the building. The exhibition will be free and open to the public from 15 April – 31 May 2019. The winners will be announced on the 14th of May, 2019.

“The Warrior” was created by experimenting with distressing negatives. I shot the image on film and then dipped the negative in various household cleaning chemicals. After that, I let it drip dry and once dried I scanned the negative, revealing the final image.

I started experimenting with this technique a year ago, after I went to a portfolio review where the reviewer told me that my work didn’t have a soul, that it lacked personality, that it was too cold and that I should consider doing something else instead of photography.

At the time, I did my best to not let their words affect me because I knew that it was only one person’s opinion about my work. But the following day, while I was at home going through the negatives of a recent shoot, I remembered their words and I took all the negatives that I was handling and soaked them bleach in the sink. After I scanned the negatives, I found the resulting images really beautiful. Since then I’ve been working on this technique.

Save the date and if you can come visit the exhibition in April. And wish me luck!

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