Jade's Photography Blog: Richard Bram

When doing research on street photography I came across an artist called Richard Bram. Bram is a street photography originally from America but moved to London in 1997. He was born in Philadelphia in 1952, but grew up in Ohio, Utah and Arizona, where he finished High School, College and Graduate School. He earned degrees in Political Science and International Business, and then a series of jobs led him to Louisville, Kentucky, where, in 1984, he lost his head and decided to pursue photography full-time as a vocation. He built his early career in public relations, public events, performance and portrait work.
After moving to London in 1997, Richard concentrated on street photography and other personal photographic projects. In July of 2008 he returned to the States, now living in the financial District of New York City. His work is in institutional, corporate, and personal collections, including the Bibliothèque Nationale de France and the George Eastman House International Museum of Photography.
On the In-Public website Bram wrote the following;
“I’m a Street Photographer. Most of my photographs originate there, in the random chaos of the street, in the ambient weirdness of everyday life.

“I expose some film nearly every day, and always carry a camera: anything could occur. It keeps me alert and awake to the world around me, even while simply on my way somewhere on an unrelated errand. These images are my personal visual diary: they are not staged or created artificially. Reality is strange enough.
“I’ve always been more drawn to black and white. I like the level of abstraction it brings: the distilled monochromatic essence of a frame without the distraction of color. ‘In black and white you look at the faces; in color you look at the clothes.’
“However, when I began making photographs, they were in color. Shooting digitally in color for commercial work has returned me to color street photography as well. Where this goes in the long run, I do not know. For now, I shoot both.”

My favorite two series of images which Bram has created are "Street Photography" and "The Underground".

"Street Photography"
"I’m a Street Photographer. Most of my photographs originate there, in the random chaos of the street, in the ambient weirdness of everyday life. To be a Street Photographer is to be, as Alex Kozloff put it, a 'professional stranger.' I expose some film nearly every day and always carry a camera: something human, curious, funny or strange could happen. Most of the time it doesn't, but one must be ready just in case. It keeps me alert and awake to the world around while simply on my way somewhere on an unrelated errand. These images are my personal visual diary: they are not staged or created artificially. Reality is strange enough." - Richard Bram

Arezzo, Italy, 2002

Oxford Street, London, 1999

Millennium Wheel, London, 1999

"The Underground"

"I spend far too much time on the London Underground. I don't do this because I particularly like to, but because it is the fastest way of getting about London on daily errands and routines. The Underground is a great leveller - all types of people are there in the cars and on the platforms going to and fro." - Richard Bram.