My name is Sam Wainwright and I am a local photographer. I was brought up in Gravesend until the age of 15 when I moved to London, where I dreamed of being in a famous band! This didn’t work out as planned and after being away from Gravesend for 23 years I moved back in March 2022.

I came very late to photography. I’ve had no formal training, but about 7 years ago I bought myself a film camera from eBay, and from that day on I have been obsessed with making photographs. At first I would take shots of everything and anything to varying degrees of success, until one day I went to visit my Nan and asked her if I could take some portraits of her. From that moment on I have been working on a long form photo documentary of my Nan’s life.

Called simply ‘Nan’ this project is my attempt to give a voice to a Lady who’s world is very small but who nevertheless is the centre of our family’s world. Born Eileen Rock in 1930 in Borough (near to London Bridge) my Nan has lived on the same road for the past 92 years and in her current council flat for well over 40 years. Until about 5 years ago she would be out everyday on the bus to Elephant and Castle or even further afield to Bean where her sister lived. This all stopped though when she started having falls and then of course the Coronavirus pandemic came about.

For the last 6 years I have visited at least once a week and documented these visits with my camera. Using black and white and colour images I have tried to paint a picture of what her life is like. Although I take quite a few portraits of her the majority of my work is candid imagery showing her just going about her everyday life. Also a lot of these images are quite “gritty’ as I don’t want to sugar-coat the ageing process and unfortunately the fact that she is now very ill.

I have also entered some of these images into competitions and have been very lucky to have her images featured in the Portrait of Britain book, The Turner Gallery in Margate, and on the front cover of a record ‘Portraits’ by the Medway band Theatre Royal. As well as this I had an Exhibition of the ‘Nan’ images as part of the Gravesham Fringe festival.

Alongside this series of images I am also working on another Long form Photo Documentary of Ebbsfleet United Fans and have recently worked on a short film based in Gravesend.

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