About

Stephen Gill (b. 1971, Bristol, UK)

Became interested in photography in his early childhood, thanks to his father and interest in insects and initial obsession with collecting bits of pond life to inspect under his microscope.

Gill’s photographs are held in various private and public collections and have also been exhibited at many international galleries, festivals and museums including London’s National Portrait Gallery, The Victoria and Albert Museum, The Museum of London, Agnes B, Victoria Miro Gallery, Christophe Guye Gallery, Sprengel Museum, Tate, Centre National de l’audiovisual, Galerie Zur Stockeregg, Archive of Modern Conflict, Gun Gallery, The Photographers’ Gallery, Palais des Beaux Arts, Leighton House Museum, Haus Der Kunst and has had solo shows in festivals including – Recontres d’Arles, The Toronto photography festival, Festival Images – Vevey and PHotoEspaña.

Selected Solo exhibitions

2004 Field Studies, The State Centre of Architecture, Moscow
2004 Field Studies, Rencontres d’Arles Photography Festival, Arles
2004 Hackney Wick, The Photographers’ Gallery, London
2005 Invisible and Lost, PhotoEspaña, Real Jardín Botánico, Madrid
2005 Stephen Gill Photographs, The Architectural Association, London
2006 Toronto Photography Festival, Toronto
2008 Anonymous Origami and Buried, Leighton House Museum, London
2008 Anonymous Origami, New York Photography Festival, New York
2009 A Series of Disappointments, Gun Gallery, Stockholm
2009 Hackney Flowers, Gaain Gallery, Seoul
2010 Hackney Flowers, G/P Gallery, Tokyo
2010 Outside In, Brighton Photo Biennial, Brighton
2011 Outside In, Gun Gallery, Stockholm
2011 Coming up for Air, GP Gallery, Tokyo
2012 Coexistence, CNA, Luxembourg
2012 Outside In, GP Gallery, Tokyo
2013 Best Before End, GP Gallery, Tokyo
2013 Series Photographs, Galeri Image, Aarhus
2013 Talking to Ants, Shoot Gallery, Oslo
2013 Best Before End, Foam Fotografie Museum, Amsterdam
2014 Series Photographs, Galleri Image, Aarhus
2015 Buried flowers coexist with disappointed ants, Christophe Guye Gallery, Zurich
2015 London Chronicles, Pôle Image, Rouen
2016 Fatigue Laboratory, Christophe Guye Gallery, Zurich
2016 Myeyefellout, The Photographers’ Gallery, London
2016 Talking to Ants, Dillon Gallery, New York
2017 Stephen Gill, La Filature, Mulhouse,
2018 Stephen Gill from document to experiment, Museum of Photography, Braunschweig
2018 Nobody’s library, Stephen Gill’s Photobooks & Young PhotoBook, The PhotoBookMuseum, Braunschweig
2018 Stephen Gill Night Procession, Jojuin, Kiyomizu Temple, Kyoto
2019 Three Nature Studies: Stephen Gill, IMA Gallery, Tokyo
2021 Stephen Gill, Coming up for Air: A Retrospective, Arnolfini, Bristol
2021 Stephen Gill, Unfold, Shiogama City Art Museum, Japan
2023 Please Notify the Sun, Fotografihuset at Sukkerbiten, Oslo
2025 Nobody’s Library, Photobook Museum, Cologne

Selected Group Exhibitions

2005 Click Double Click, Haus Der Kunst, Munich
2005 Photography 2005, Victoria Miro Gallery, London
2006 European Eyes on Japan, Kagoshima Museum of Art, Kagoshima
2006 Says the Junk in the Yard, Flowers East, London
2006 Something That I’ll Never Really See, The V&A, London
2008 Anonymous Origami and Disappointments, St. Ann’s Warehouse, New York
2008 Parrworld, Haus Der Kunst, Munich
2009 London Calling, James Hyman Gallery, London
2009 Sound Escapes, Space, Hackney, London
2009 After Color, Bose Pacia, New York
2009 Borderspaces, Schwartz Gallery, Hackney Wick, London
2009 What You See Is What You Get, CNA, Luxembourg
2010 Outside In – Strange & Familiar, Brighton Museum & Art Gallery, Brighton
2011 Photography Calling, Sprengel Museum, Hanover
2012 Thresholds, Belfast Exposed, Belfast
2012 Residual Traces, Photofusion, London
2012 Juxtaposition, See Studio, Hackney Wick, London
2012 Retrospex, Elevator Gallery, Hackney Wick, London
2012 Et Cetera, Hoxton Art Gallery, London
2012 No Exit – Off Ground, Helsinki Photography Biennial, Helsinki
2013 Hackney Wick, Belfast Exposed, Belfast
2014 The Return to Reason, Wendi Norris, San Francisco
2014 Talking to Ants, Bienne Festival of Photography, Zurich
2014 Urban Spirit, Chistophe Guye Gallery, Zurich
2015 Beneath the Surface, Somerset House from the V&A collection, London
2015 British Photography from the 1960’s to Today, Oct Loft, Shenzhen
2015 Beastly, Winterthur Fotomuseum, Winterthur
2015 Hackney Flowers, Fotografia Europea, Reggio Emilia
2016 Coexistence, Images Vevey, Vevey
2016 Water, Pondy Photo, Pondicherry
2016 The State I am in, Internationale Photoszene Köln
2017 Biennale de l’Image Possible, Liège
2017 Hackney Flowers, Goa Photography Festival, Panjim
2018 Collecting Photography: From Daguerreotype to Digital, V&A, London
2020 The Pillar, Images Vevey, Vevey
2021 The Pillar, Images Gibellina, Sicily
2021 Eye is a Camera, House of Salvador Dali, Casaques
2024 Science/Fiction – A Non History of Plants, La MEP, Paris

Site specific

2007 Hackney Flowers, Street Exhibition, East London
2006 Billboards on Billboards Street exhibition, London
2005 Cashpoint machines, London

Selected Writing and Interviews

2001 Framed, Thomas Sutcliffe, The Independent Magazine
2003 The Wick, Martin Murray, Source Magazine
2003 Postcards from Britain, Stephen Gill, Granta
2003 Confessions of a Vino Virgin, Jon Ronson, The Guardian Weekend, May (Read here)
2003 Hackney Wick, Sarah Kent, Time Out
2003 Straight out of the ordinary, Elaine Paterson, Metro Newspaper, July (Read here)
2003 Eye Catching, Paul Wombell, Design Week
2003 Destination Unknown, Jon Ronson, The Guardian Weekend, May
2004 A Keen Observer of Life, Creative Review
2004 The Kindness of Strangers, Jon Ronson, The Guardian Weekend, May (Read here)
2004 Message au dos, Liberation newspaper
2004 A book of field studies, Jane Fletcher, Source Magazine
2005 Hommes Invisibles, Sophie Malexis, Le Monde 2, June (Read here)
2005 Le photographe en anthropologie de la ville, Michel Guerrin, Le Monde, June (Read here)
2005 Invisible, Photo News
2005 Photo España, Tim Clark, Next Level Magazine, Issue #8
2005 Now You See Them, Jon Ronson, The Guardian Weekend, January (Read here)
2006 Hackney Wick, Gerry Badger, Ag Magazine
2006 Hackney Wick, MH, Foto8 Magazine
2006 Lost Treasure, Iain Sinclair, The Guardian Weekend, March (Read here)
2007 Stephen Gill Interview, Photographica
2007 Invariably Eden, Christof Schaden, Foam Magazine
2007 Unseen UK review, Geoff Dyer, Aperture Magazine
2007 Hackney Flowers, Photography Book of the year, The Times, December
2007 Buried, Anthony Lasala, Photo Eye Magazine, September
2007 Fragments of a poem, Jeong Eun Kim, Iann Magazine
2008 Most Influential in Book publishing – PDN
2008 Lost forever, Angharad Lewis, Grafiks
2008 Flowers East, Angharad Lewis, Grafik
2008 Interview, Toyoko Ito, Studio Voice Japan
2008 Hackney Flowers, Japan Esquire
2008 Fragments of a Poem, Jeong Eun Kim, IANN, September
2008 Fascinatie, Erik Kessels, Adformatie, July
2009 Stephen Gill, Marcel Feil, Foam Magazine no 19
2009 The Wicker Man, Sarah Birch, The Hackney Citizen, June (Read here)
2009 The hope of photography, Shigeo Goto, Quotation Magazine
2009 Suwako Fukai, Quotation Magazine
2010 Stephen Gill’s Best Shot, Andrew Pulver, The Guardian, March (Read here)
2010 The bigger picture, Tamsin Blanchard, Telegraph Magazine, June
2010 Shots in the dark, Francis Hodgson, Financial Times Weekend, October
2010 Coming up for Air, Bruno Cesche, Photoworks, November (Read here)
2010 Self publish or be dammed, Sean O’Hagan, The Guardian, June (Read here)
2010 The Devil in the Detail, Tamsin Blanchard, The Telegraph Magazine, June (Read here)
2010 Creepy Crawlies, The Guardian
2011 A Little about Stephen Gill, Hiroshi Eguchi, Huge, January
2011 The world inside a camera, Nozlee Samadzadeh, the morning news, April (Read here)
2011 Hackney Calling, Ulf Ziegler, Monopol, April
2011 Self Publishing Done Right, Conor Risch, PDN, February (Read here)
2011 Outside In, Erik Vroons, GUP no 31
2012 Piecing Together a sense of place, Sophie Wright, Foam Magazine, April
2012 The Art of dissent, Stephen Gill, Marshgate Press, June
2012 A letter to Stephen Gill, Emma Dauris, The Wick
2012 The Wonderful World of Stephen Gill, BJP
2012 Ab nach London, Stephen Gill. Monopol, July
2012 Underneath the pavement lies the beach, Sue Steward, BJP, July
2012 Outside in, Foam Magazine, October
2012 Interview, Blink Magazine, August (Read here)
2012 Unpublished Hackney Flowers, Huge Magazine
2012 The Marrying Kind, The New York Times Magazine, March
2013 The streets of London, Merel Bem, de Volkskrant, May
2013 Best Before End, Exhibition Review, Fanny Landstrom, June
2013 Best Before End, Bill Kouwenhoven, Hotshoe, July
2013 The secret life of pigeons, Liz Jobey, FT Weekend Magazine, July
2013 Not in Service newspaper, Iain Sinclair
2013 Coexistence, Jeffrey Ladd, Times Lightbox (Read here)
2014 Harmony, Chaos and Confusion, Marc Feustel. The Eyes, April (Read here)
2013 Best Before End, Christian van der Kooy, Invisible man magazine, September
2014 Studio visit Stephen Gill, James Brown, Paper Journal, August
2014 Best Before End, Stephen Gill, Mikio Kikuta, IMA, September
2014 Hackney Kisses, Stephen Gill, Edward Dimsdale, Hotshoe.
2015 Stephen Gill, Hackney kisses, FT Weekend Magazine, January
2015 Snappy ever after, Cheryl Newman, Telegraph Magazine, February
2015 What lies beneath, Martin Barnes, FT Weekend Magazine, May
2015 London Energy Drink, Politiken, October
2015 Talking to Ants, Photo News Cologne
2015 Habitat, Alexis Desgagnés, Ciel Variable no 99
2015 Stephen Gill, Talking to Ants, Photonews, February
2017 Night Procession, Stephen Gill, FT Magazine, May (Read here)
2017 Reisen til nattens ende, Ola Vikas, Dagens Naringsliv, September
2018 Night Procession, Robert Dunn, Photobookstore Magazine, January (Read here)
2018 Night Procession, Brad Feuerhelm, American Suburb X, January
2018 Night Procession, Stefan Vanthuyne, De Standaard, January
2018 Night Procession, Photo News, February
2018 Coming up for air, Stephen Gill, Cartography no 4
2018 Stephen Gill, Een parallelle wereld, PF, September
2019 The Pillar, Stephen Gill, FT Magazine, January (Read here)
2019 The Pillar, Marigold Warner, British Journal of Photography, July (read here)
2019 Stephen Gill Special, IMA, June
2019 Stephen Gill, The Pillar, Erik Vroons, GUP no 61
2019 Stephen Gill, The Pillar, Luce Lebart, Reliefs No 10
2019 Landeerlabubnis, Cristian Troster, Lufthansa Magazine no 6
2019 Stephen Gill, The Pillar, Photonews no 9, September
2020 The Pillar, Pen no 502
2020 Butterfly Training with Stephen Gill, Free Time no 02
2020 Aperçue dùn monde parallèle, Audrey Magat, Metore, July
2020 Une déontologie photographique, Alexis Desgagnés, Ciel Variable no 114
2021 Stephen Gill’s Sublime Decay, Please Notify the Sun, Brad Feuerhelm, ASX, February (Read here)
2021 Stephen Gill, Please Notify The Sun, Blake Andrews, Collector daily, January (Read here)

Awards

2020 The Pillar / Årets Bedste Bogarbejde / Best Book work / Denmark
2020 The Pillar / National Book Art award / Sweden
2020 The Pillar / Shortlist / Photo Espania
2020 The Pillar / Shortlist / Svenska Fotobokpriset
2019 The Pilar / Les Rencontres d’Arles author book award
2018 Night Procession / Shortlist / Svenska Fotobokpriset
2017 Night Procession / 2017 Hariban Award / Benrido Japan
2010 PHotoEspaña Photography Boook Award – Nobody “Outstanding Publishing House of the Year”
2009 A Series of Disappointments, Photo Eye, Best books
2008 Hackney Flowers, Shorlisted in Arles Book Award
2008 Hackney Flowers, Photobook award, Kasseler fotoforum
2008 Anonymous Origami, runner up in Specific Object Award
2008 Anonymous Origami, shortlisted Photo Espania Book award
2008 Hackney Flowers, Photography Book of the year, The Times
2007 Buried, Shorlisted in Arles Book Award
2007 Hackney Wick – Winner of Photo Eye best books
2007 Buried, Photo District News Award, Best Books
2006 Winner of Vic Odden Award
2006 Hackney Wick, Shorlisted in Arles Book Award
2006 Invisible, Photo District News Award, Best Books
2005 Invisible, Shorlisted in Arles Book Award
2004 Field Studies, Photo District News Award, Best Books
2004 Winner of John Kobal Book Award for “A book of Field Studies”
2003 Field Studies, Shorlisted in Arles Book Award
2002 John Kobal 10th Anniversary, National Portrait Gallery
2001 John Kobal Portrait Award
1997 World Press Master Class, The Netherlands
1996 John Kobal Portrait Award
1996 Ernst Haas Golden Light Award, USA
1986 Kodak Pet Portrait Award

Quotes

“Stephen Gill has learnt this: to haunt the places that haunt him. His photo-accumulations demonstrate a tender vision factored out of experience; alert, watchful, not overeager, wary of that mendacious conceit, ‘closure’. There is always flow, momentum, the sense of a man passing through a place that delights him. A sense of stepping down, immediate engagement, politic exchange. Then he remounts the bicycle and away. Loving retrievals, like a letter to a friend, never possession… What I like about Stephen Gill is that he has learnt to give us only as much as we need, the bones of the bones of the bones…”
Iain Sinclair