Sharks Awards

Max Forsythe

I grew up in Northern Ireland and studied Graphic Design at Belfast College of Art. From there I went to the London College of Printing for a postgraduate course. I switched from art direction to photography in 1972 and specialised in location and reportage. I have always extolled the virtues of colour in photography, even when it was deeply unfashionable in the 70’s and 80’s and published a book called ‘Colour Prejudice’ containing a collection of images that could not work without colour. I often shoot in countries that are uninhibited in their approach to and use of colour, like Ireland, Morocco, Africa and the Caribbean. I had my first one man show at Hamilton’s Gallery, London in 1984, where I also exhibited in 1992.

‘Incidental Images’ was shown at the Association of Photographers Gallery, London in 2001 and ‘Drive by Shooting’ was first exhibited at the Lupe Gallery, London in 2004. A book of the same name was published in 2004. I joined with a small group of other photographers in 2006 to form a high quality image library called Lensmodern. My work is in the collections of The Royal Photographic Society and The National Museum of Photography. In 2009 one of my pictures was selected for the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition. I live in Richmond Surrey with my wife Jane.