Kerry Curl

Kerry Curl is a UK based award winning photographic artist working with photography, moving image and installation. Intuitive and open to experimentation, Kerry's work fuses genres as she works at the intersection of portraiture, fashion and documentary, exploring the lines between the boundaries. Her practice frequently draws on the influence of the past in today’s world to question the idea of nostalgia, sustainability, consumerism. Creating visual responses to history and its prominence in the now, vintage and secondhand clothing have long been a feature within her work.

Her achievements include being awarded winning image status in the British Journal of Photography’s Portrait of Britain in 2017 and 2019, a finalist in the Graduate Fashion Week Fashion Photography Award 2017 and finalist in the AOP Student Photographer award 2017. Kerry was granted funding to create a new multimedia installation project for the Norwich Fringe Festival 2021 and recently completed a research and development artist residency at the Norwich Shoe Factory.

Instagram: @kerrycurl

Where would you like your work to take you?

I've realised that for me there may be no final destination/sense of arrival, because I will always want to keep learning and evolving. I'm love the freedom working with photography, video art and installation is gives me. I'm open minded as to what the path I'm on is which is unnerving at times but that feeling also pushes me to make/share/reflect/develop.

Which part of your creative process do you enjoy most?

I really enjoy it when I'm pulling a idea from a thought into reality. My work is often conceptual and so I style a lot of my own work and direct it myself. Seeing the concept take shape and choosing how much control to keep or lose is an important part of my process and my progress.

Where do you draw inspiration from?

I find inspiration everywhere but my dissertation was focused on the 70s, it's continuing influence on image makers and how DISCO contributed to popular culture and society. That was in 2016 and I still refer back to that research. I'm still drawing on the influence of the past in today’s world and creating my own visual responses to history and its prominence in the now.

What piece of music would you say compliments your work the most?

I often like playing with sound and not in a way that's picked to be especially complimentary but just adds that 'something' I like. Such as the way Mad Men or The Sopranos songs at the end of an episode were part of the work yet also somehow 'other' and made you think/react as you weren't expecting that. I'm listening to a lot of Nancy and Lee at the moment and have used it a few times in in my IG reels so that's a presence in the work right now.

Can you list a couple other creatives/friends/people you look to for inspiration?

I've collaborated with Movement Artist @wamyollet so much. She's a constant inspiration. Other inspiring humans are artists @emilycannellartist and @emma. Video Artist @seanhancockphotofilm. Illustrator @morwennafarrell and Fashion Educator @allyhilly plus Madonna, Tracey Emin and David Bowie.