Book / Still Life. Killing Time.

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Still Life. Killing Time.
Documenting long-term incarceration and the passage of time

Taken over the course of more than a year of exclusive access, this work uses large-format still-life photography in the context of a unique prison community: the E Wing at Kingston Prison in Portsmouth. For eight years this was Britain's only wing dedicated to holding elderly lifers: murderers, rapists, paedophiles and other violent criminals between 50 to 80 years old.

This book by the photographer Ed Clark explores the experience of long-term incarceration and the passage of time. The recurring motifs – bars, squares, boxes, grids – show the segmentation and ordering of time and space that is fundamental to prison life, while the details of the inmates’ possessions suggest their state of mind and how they adapt to long-term incarceration and getting old within an institution.

By careful editing the images and working on narrative and juxtaposition with the photographer, we opted for an extremely clean layout in which the pictures – also incarcerated inside frames – silently convey the photographer's experience.

Client: Ed Clark
Publisher: Dewi Lewis
Designed at Atelier Works