Too Many Man: Women of Grime
© Ellie RamsdenToo Many Man: Women of Grime documents women involved in the UK grime scene, showcasing those behind the mic and behind the scenes, from MCs and DJs to producers and journalists. Since the genre began in the early 2000s, grime has been hugely male-dominated. Like many male-dominated spaces, women have a significant influence on the scene but often aren't given the same platform or recognition as their male counterparts. This project seeks to ask why and gives the women of Grime a platform to share their thoughts and experiences.
The project title is named after the 2009 song ‘Too Many Man’ by Skepta, in which the grime MC expresses his frustration with the “lack of women in clubs”; this is re-conceptualised as a comment on not only the club scene but a wider observation on the genre itself.
First published as a photo-book in 2019, a second edition was released in March 2021 and includes new and updated content. The project comprises portraits, interviews, handwritten lyrics, live music shots, and urban landscapes.
click to view the complete set of images in the archive
Elvies
© Ellie RamsdenEvery year, 40,000 Elvis impersonators and fans descend on a small seaside town in South Wales to celebrate the rock legend’s life and music. Powthcawl, a seemingly unlikely place to host the largest Elvis Presley festival in the world, gives a surreal backdrop to the weekend.
Organiser, Peter Phillips, started the Elvis festival two decades ago to raise money to save the local theatre, the Grand Pavilion. Just 500 people attended the event the first year - now, the whole town is taken over for the weekend. Every pub books Elvis impersonators, and revellers dress up in costumes. There's a Young Elvis competition, and a 'Hound Dog' prize for the best-dressed mutt.
The festival offers a weekend of escapism to our often serious and stressful realities. Become Elvis and let all your worries wash away!
click to view the complete set of images in the archive
Walking Distance
© Sarah Burton FieldingSarah Burton Fielding’s Walking Distance reads like a quiet, heartfelt love letter to the 6 years she lived in Hackney and the everyday rhythms of London life. After moving from New Zealand in 2016, the environment felt fresh and energising, and so Sarah took in the city the way she knew best, setting out on foot to document her new neighbourhood.
Rather than a straightforward documentary, Walking Distance is shaped by emotion and memory. A mosaic of people, colours, architecture, gardens and the light sweeping over it all. She favoured the spicy energy of summer evenings and searched for everyday momentsto elevate.
Pushing herself outside her comfort zone into street portraits, Sarah found that the simple act of asking strangers for pictures led to some of her favourite shots and became part of the greater tapestry of community she was capturing. The portrait of a vendor and his son at a jerk-chicken stand was featured in Portrait of Britain 2020 (British Journal of Photography).
Against the backdrop of national and global upheaval, Walking Distance offers a grounded, intimate portrait of daily life unfolding on the streets, a testament to continuity and connection.
click to view the complete set of images in the archive
The Island of the Colorblind
© Sanne De Wilde“Color is just a word to those who cannot see it.”
In the late eighteenth century, a catastrophic typhoon swept across Pingelap, a remote atoll in the Pacific Ocean. Among the few survivors was the island’s king—a carrier of a rare genetic mutation: achromatopsia. As he fathered many children, the gene quietly spread, and over generations, many Pingelapese came to see the world in black and white. Achromatopsia is marked by extreme light sensitivity—daylight is unbearably bright, moonlight turns night into day—reduced visual acuity, and a complete absence of color vision.
In The Island of the Colorblind, De Wilde experiments with alternative ways of seeing. Using black-and-white photography, infrared imaging, and collaborative photo-paintings, she constructs a layered visual language that embraces ‘the diversity of seeing and being’ and opens up a world of colorful possibilities and diverse realities. Photographing the islanders—who in Pingelapese are referred to as blind (maskun)—resulted in a conceptual selection of images in which eyes, faces, or vision itself are partially obscured, for we can never truly see through someone else’s eyes.
Flames burn in grayscale; trees shimmer with unexpected tones. Candyfloss forests and bubblegum-colored waters emerge, pinks rising from leaves as rainbows dissolve into gradients of grey—a spectrum reimagined. The Island of the Colorblind invites viewers into a dreamlike exploration of color and perception. It asks: what might the world look like through an unconditioned, colorblind mind? If those who cannot see color could paint it with their imagination, how would they depict trees, oceans, or even themselves? And perhaps—are those of us who see in color the ones who are truly blind?
The project culminates in an immersive installation that deepens the encounter, building a sensory bridge between islanders and viewers, between perception and imagination.
click to view the complete set of images in the archive
Book published by Hannibal Books & co-published by Kehrer [SOLD OUT]
Softcover
UV-sensitive, changes in sunlight 22,5 x 28 cm
160 pages
85 color illustrations
English
Out of print
ISBN 978-3-86828-826-1 2017
Artist: Sanne De Wilde
Texts:
Arnon Grunberg, Azu Nwagbogu, Oliver Sacks, Katharina Smets, Duncan Speakman, Roel Van Gils, Sanne De Wilde
Design:
Tim Bisschop
Softcover
UV-sensitive, changes in sunlight 22,5 x 28 cm
160 pages
85 color illustrations
English
Out of print
ISBN 978-3-86828-826-1 2017
Artist: Sanne De Wilde
Texts:
Arnon Grunberg, Azu Nwagbogu, Oliver Sacks, Katharina Smets, Duncan Speakman, Roel Van Gils, Sanne De Wilde
Design:
Tim Bisschop
As Real As It Gets
© Thomas NolfAs Real As It Gets is a photography project by Thomas Nolf that explores the human need for escape through aviation culture.
During the COVID-19 lockdown, Nolf rediscovered his childhood dream of becoming a pilot. At a time when travel was prohibited, he installed the latest version of Microsoft Flight Simulator on his computer and embarked on a virtual journey. The memory of the slogan “As Real As It Gets” — printed on the box of Flight Simulator 1998 — inspired him to seek out plane spotters around international airports and meet flight simulator pilots at home. Through their fascination with aviation, they found ways to keep their dreams alive or to temporarily escape from reality.
Flight simulator pilots are passionate about building cockpits at home.
Some mount multiple screens to their desks, while others use actual aircraft parts to create immersive environments. These simulators offer a structured escape from the chaos of everyday life — a world where navigation is often harder. In the cockpit, with its switches and procedures, they find structure, autonomy, and control.
The plane spotters, on the other hand, operate in the real world. They observe, document, and photograph aircraft with great precision.
While most stand at a safe distance along runways, a more adventurous scene unfolds at Maho Beach in Saint Martin (Caribbean), where tourists gather in the jet stream of approaching planes. Against a backdrop of turquoise water and azure skies, they feel the thrill of jets skimming just overhead before landing a few hundred metres away — a spectacle that has turned Maho Beach into an iconic holiday destination.
Nolf combines photography with simulated imagery, personal diary text fragments, and childhood snapshots to explore aviation’s romantic and dreamlike appeal. His refined compositions and colour treatments echo the stylised, almost surreal aesthetics of video games, film, and advertising.
Whether photographing Maho Beach or a runway in Miniatur Wunderland, Nolf frames each scene to highlight its artificial, staged quality. The people in his images appear caught in a still, stylised version of reality — suspended somewhere between fiction and truth.It’s within this ambiguity that the project thrives, blurring the lines between documentary and dream.
As Real As It Gets is both a collective portrait and a personal story. It reflects on our shared desire to escape, to find freedom — if only for a moment — and to dream of flight in a world that often feels heavy
click to view the complete set of images in the archive
Published by Art Paper Editions
Design & Edit by Thomas Nolf & Jurgen Maelfeyt
March 2025, English, Dutch
24 × 30 cm, 200 p, ills. color, hardcover
ISBN 9789083438481
Texts by Thomas Nolf & Arnon Grunberg
click to buy
Design & Edit by Thomas Nolf & Jurgen Maelfeyt
March 2025, English, Dutch
24 × 30 cm, 200 p, ills. color, hardcover
ISBN 9789083438481
Texts by Thomas Nolf & Arnon Grunberg
click to buy