Source
Spring 2001

Photography has often been seen as having a dual nature; part art, part science. In this issue we have two essays that look at photography in the scientific domain. Tracey Heatherington discusses the way science is pictured in a popular science magazine and the implications this has for the way science is understood in the broader culture.

In contrast to the ‘high-tech’ and forbidding image of science, Malin Starrett is concerned that we have lost touch with a ‘hands on’ experience of scientific practice that makes it accessible and meaningful to us. He has been investigating the phenomenon of coloured shadows, research that has taken him back to the 19th century, involved him restaging many old colour experiments and led him to re-evaluate current scientific thinking about colour.

The Belfast skyline is changing rapidly, with many new buildings having appeared over the last two years. John Davies has been photographing ‘post-industrial’ cities such as Birmingham, Swansea, and Glasgow. His aim is to ‘capture a sense of industrial history as well as exploring new developments.’ We publish here his pictures of Belfast, that are here introduced by Colin Graham who reflects upon the personal and collective memory of the changing city.

Audrey Fynn’s black and white portraits Bird Men examine the world of breeding and showing Canaries. A passionate hobby inspiring an unfaltering devotion from the men to their beloved birds.

On the occasion of Victor Sloan‘s retrespective at the Ormeau Baths gallery we publish a series of photographs made in Bangor during the 1986 protests against the Anglo-Irish agreement. We include an excerpt from an interview with the artist that will be available in its entirety on the relaunched Source website, details of which will be announced in the next issue.

Source is a quarterly photography magazine, available in print and as a digital edition, published in Belfast, Northern Ireland. They publish emerging photographic work and engage with the latest in contemporary photography through news, thoughtful features and reviews of the latest exhibitions and books from Ireland and the UK. Their website brings together an archive of writing and pictures from the magazine alongside current features.¹