Former member of the women’s photo agency Format with work extensively published and exhibited

During the 1980s and early 1990s Melanie Friend worked extensively as a photojournalist; her work was published in a range of publications including The Guardian and The Independent. In 1986 she joined the women’s photography agency Format. From the mid 1990s she began to focus on the wider aspects of war through long-term photographic projects, sometimes using sound as well as images. Exhibitions included Homes & Gardens: Documenting the Invisible (1996) which highlighted human rights abuses in Kosovo, and Border Country (2007), which documented the experiences of asylum seekers detained in the UK’s immigration removal centres; both toured internationally. Her book No Place Like Home: Echoes from Kosovo was published in 2001 (Midnight Editions, USA).

The Home Front (2013), a touring exhibition originally curated by Pippa Oldfield of Impressions Gallery, looked at the links between the military, marketing and entertainment, with a particular focus on air shows; it was published as a book by Dewi Lewis in association with Impressions Gallery. In autumn 2020 The Home Front was shown as a solo show at Farleys Gallery, UK, alongside Lee Miller’s WWII work Grim Glory: Lee Miller’s Britain at War.

In October 2020 her latest work, The Plain, focusing on the military training area of Salisbury Plain, was published by Dewi Lewis. From 2003 to 2019 Melanie taught photography at the University of Sussex.

https://www.melaniefriend.com

All images © Melanie Friend Used here with permission.