Spirit of Gaiety: The Shot That Got Me Into My First Exhibition

I've been taking photos seriously for a couple of years now. Not seriously in the sense that I've always had a plan, more that I started caring, really caring, about what I was pointing a camera at and why. I shoot everything. Street scenes, landscapes, events, quiet moments. I haven't landed on a defined style yet, and for a long time that felt like something I should be worried about.

This is partly the story of why I've stopped worrying about it.

Earlier this year I was in London as the trip photographer for a UL course visit, a role I'd taken on as part of my President's Volunteer Award. That meant I had my camera out constantly, documenting the group, the city, the in-between moments that tend to matter more in hindsight than they do in the instant. It was a great trip, but it was also a busy one. I was always thinking about the next shot, the next location, the next thing to document.

Then we visited the Victoria and Albert Museum, and somewhere in the middle of it all I turned a corner and stopped. There was a statue positioned right in front of a large gridded window. The light coming through was soft and diffused, warm and almost amber, and the figure was almost entirely in silhouette against it. The wings caught just enough light to show their texture and colour. The grid of the window created a perfect geometric backdrop.

The composition came together instantly. I raised the camera and took the shot without really thinking about it. That was it. I had no idea at the time what I was actually looking at. I looked it up afterwards, it's called The Spirit of Gaiety, a figure originally created for the Gaiety Theatre.

Back home I brought the image into editing. I pushed the contrast, worked on the colour grading to deepen the warmth of that backlight, let the shadows go as dark as they could. I wanted the edit to do what the moment did, pull you toward the figure before you've had a chance to think about it.

When UL Photography Society opened submissions for their exhibition, I went back and forth for a while about what to submit. I landed on this one because even though I can't fully articulate my photographic style yet, this image felt like it pointed at it. I was nervous between submitting and seeing it on the wall. More than I expected to be, honestly.

The opening was busy. There were people I knew there, and people I didn't. At some point I found myself watching strangers pause in front of my photo. I watched someone I didn't recognise look at it for a few seconds longer than a passing glance. I don't know what they thought. I didn't ask. There's something about a stranger pausing in front of your work that no amount of likes on a screen can replicate.

Seeing your name on a card beside printed work is strange. It makes it real in a way that a screen never quite does. For a couple of years I'd been shooting mostly for myself, quietly building something without being entirely sure what I was building toward. This felt like the first external confirmation that whatever I'm developing is legible to someone other than me. That it's worth looking at.

I've been shooting more intentionally since. Not more cautiously, more awake. Paying closer attention to what it is that makes me stop and raise the camera. I think that instinct is where my style actually lives, and I'm learning to trust it more.

The Spirit of Gaiety. I didn't know what it was when I photographed it. But maybe that was exactly the point.