This London photographer has taken haunting photos of her local park every day

Until a few weeks ago, Jemima Yong photographed performances in theatres and galleries. Then lockdown happened. Since then she’s been shooting from the window of her seventh-floor flat in south-east London. It was tricky at first, then the photographer started focusing her attention on the green space beneath her block. 

The result? ‘Field’, a series of 30 images, capturing outdoor life in the new normal. Her favourite is the first one she took, capturing a family playing tag. She also loves one she took of two teenagers, each with their own football. ‘It’s a poignant reflection of this time of self-isolation,’ she says. ‘Social distancing is being observed and the community seems to share this public space well. A visual pattern emerges – we are alone together.’

That sense of loneliness is also explored through the style of the photographs. In stark black-and-white, there’s no real sense of the time or era in which they take place. Yong says that one of the principles of the project is to avoid photographing the edges of the park. ‘Leaving the exact location and size of the green ambiguous gives the series of photographs more space to be a reflection of something bigger,’ she says. ‘[It’s] the moment we find ourselves in.’  Scroll down for more of the series.

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