Martin Parr: Oxford brings together a set of commissioned work produced in the University of Oxford, between 2014 and 2016 by Martin Parr, one of the world’s leading photographers and president of Magnum Photos from 2013 to 2017. The images capture the day-to-day life of the colleges and university at work and at play, and the colourful rituals that are most distinctive.
Parr spent two years to document a ‘hidden Oxford’ with his characteristically witty and unflinching eye. Commissioned by the Bodleian Libraries and Oxford University Press, Parr’s photographs capture the quirks of university life and reveal aspects of academic communities that are rarely accessible to the outsider.
Looking behind-the-scenes at Oxford rituals, ceremonies, and traditions that still hold significance today, Parr shows students’ antics at sporting events, clubs, and societies, as well as the core university activities of research and teaching. This body of work is being exhibited in Hong Kong for the first time at f22 foto space. With a selection of 59 photographs, the exhibition allows us to experience university life in one of the world’s oldest and most storied universities.
This exhibition is organised with the kind support of the Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford.
Martin Parr is one of the best-known documentary photographers of his generation. With over 100 books of his own published, and another 30 edited by Parr, his photographic legacy is already established. Parr also acts as a curator and editor. He has curated two photography festivals, Arles in 2004 and Brighton Biennial in 2010. More recently Parr curated the Barbican exhibition, Strange and Familiar. Parr has been a member of the Magnum agency since 1994 and was President from 2013 – 2017. In 2013 Parr was appointed the visiting professor of photography at the University of Ulster. Parr’s work has been collected by many of the major museums, from the Tate, the Pompidou and the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Martin Parr established the Martin Parr Foundation in 2017.
Martin Parr : Oxford
6 December 2019 to 15 February 2020
f22 foto space
5/F Amber Commercial Building
70-74 Morrison Hill Road, Wan Chai, Hong Kong
