Published
Mon, Nov 28, 2022, 13:10
- The photos capture special moments at house, techno, dubstep and drum & bass events since the early '00s.
Photographer and music theorist Sarah Ginn is releasing a coffee-table book capturing dance music since the early '00s.
Out in May 2023 through Velocity Press, Super Sharp Shooter has been two years in the making. 800-plus images, many of them previously unseen, capture the vibe at clubs and festivals such as Glastonbury, Boomtown Fair, Outlook, fabric, Printworks and Ultra Festival. Featured artists include Andy C, Shy FX, Goldie, Miss Kittin, Ben UFO and Carl Cox.
Ginn, who was fabric's in-house photographer from 2006 through 2017, abandoned a career in design for photography, falling in love with the art form in her mid-20s.
"I feel music photography is an extreme form of pilates," Ginn told Resident Advisor. "You have to remain zen in the madness of a rave to get the shot. I have a flow state where it's almost like focused meditation in a way. Your observations of the environment have to be finely tuned to capture the images you want over the amount of distractions around you."
Of all the genres captured in Ginn's work, drum & bass is her favourite because it was the soundtrack of her youth. That said, her most cherished image is of Skream & Benga at London festival SW4 in 2012. She almost deleted it on the spot because it looked overexposed.
"I like the fact you can't see the audience–and that audience was massive," she said. "All you can see is Beni and Oli vibing with each other along to the music, which is how they rolled in those days. They almost had this telepathic communication that the best duos have."
Super Sharp Shooter marks a profound comeback for Ginn, who quit the music industry in 2017 due to "misogyny and bullying" from male artists. She said the situation "jettisoned" her career for five years. The "misogynistic and clique nature of music photography" still makes it an "uphill battle" to get regular bookings, she added. 80 percent of the bookings she's received since 2015 were from women.
"A year ago, I thought I could either give up and walk away again–and I did that multiple times this year–or I could just become excellent," she said. "So I made a plan of working in a way that could change the way we view music photography."
Quitting the industry and relaunching as Sarah Ginn Studio has enabled Ginn to widen the scope of her projects as both a photographer and music theorist.
"Photography isn't about being cool and hanging out with artists, bolstering your own ego and monetary greed or squashing those different to you because of their race, sex or sexuality," she said. "It's to visually communicate the inherent magic of how music makes us feel collectively and inclusively. That's what I do. It's time to let me out from under the glass ceiling and set me free."
The book also features an essay, written by Ginn, about the synergy and creative feedback loop between DJs and the crowd.
"This synergy inspires the minds of those who witness and hear the set, so they go off and make their own art," Ginn said. "It means your creations never really die, they live on through others, therefore that creativity is amplified like an audio feedback loop. It was a profound realisation to view music in that way."
Pre-order a copy of Super Sharp Shooter. UK-based customers have the option to add an exclusive A2 poster.
Here's the cover and more photos.
Photos: Sarah Ginn
Correction, November 28th: A previous version of this article said Ginn uses they/them pronouns. She actually uses she/her.
Photos: Sarah Ginn Correction, November 28th: A previous version of this article said Ginn uses they/them pronouns. She actually uses she/her.