I miss magazines. And in particular, ones that actually commission original portraiture for arts stories. And ones that trust photographers to build a relationship with the subject on site and aim for a variety of images that subtly reflect the work and artist. And allow for improvisation.
When you’re doing editorial portraiture, the audience for your work is not the subject. In most cases it is an unknowable, general interest audience. But so many art publications have folded in Canada in recent years so for these portraits of painter Graham Gillmore, whose work I’ve greatly admired for decades, I simply assigned myself … for VR Media.
I’d always wanted to meet and chat with Graham so we improvised some portraits at the time of his 2025 show at Monte Clark’s titled “Behold and Be A Genius”. We spoke in person, then followed up with a few calls and emails after his return to his new home in Belleville, Ontario. I published an edit on the VR Media site which I have been running since 2013:
https://vancouverreviewmedia.com/having-words-with-graham-gillmore/
I am placing the portraits here in reverse order to the way they appeared on the site. The reason is that this last one, here below, was the obvious lead that I would imagine a commissioning editor would choose. It has a direct connection to an answer given in the interview. But sometimes the quieter, secondary shots are just as strong on second glance.
