People's Choice Award NPPP 2023

I would just like to say congratulations again for being one of the finalists in the National Photographic Portrait Prize for this year. And I'd like to invite you to tell us a little bit about your portrait.

Okay, so the portrait's of Vicky. So I got Vicky contacted me on social media because I'm a Kiwi originally. So I was looking for, I was actually looking for someone that had a tā moko, which is the Maori tattoo. And Vicky sent me a message saying that she hasn't got a tattoo, that she's looked at some of my photos and felt comfortable if I could come and take a photo of her. Because she had no photos in her house, her and no mirrors and all that sort of stuff. And she said she had a little bit of, do you think her words, she said, "I'm a little, been a little bit burnt." Vicky's a pretty amazing lady, pretty tough, I think in her words. She said if I was a Pākehā, which is like Maori first, you know, us whiteies, that I probably wouldn't have survived in her strength, that's what got her through. So lots of surgeries, she was going in for a surgery the next day, just to loosen everything up. So I said, look, after that we'll take the photo. And she's like, no, no, just take the photo now. So it was lunchtime, we sat outside, the worst possible conditions to take a photo ever. Direct sun, everything, it was just brutal.

And I said, look, we'll take some photos, I might have to come back. And most of the photos are absolutely rubbish, to be perfectly honest. And this one sort of shone. And sometimes when you edit photos, they take on a bit of a life of their own. And this one just did. So I phoned Vicky, I said, look, you know, we obviously can't, you know, it's not going to be, you know, like a glamour shot or anything. So we're trying, it's sort of taking on the life of a photo that's got, you know, really shows her warrior spirit. And so I sort of shared that with her and then Vicky started crying and it's like, yeah, keep going with that, it's fine. The bun carving around her neck represents the two children, which is sort of lost because of what happened, which because of all this, they're actually coming back into her life, which is pretty special. So yeah, it's a fairly emotional journey. I've been on with Vicky. I suppose sort of embedded in the photo. I like to think is the, you know, the relationship that we developed like on the day and was developed over time and that keeps getting stronger.

So yeah, it was from originally I said, I said that I wouldn't take the photo. And then she's the question was like, why not? And I said, well, because I'm not really a photographer. I said, I'm just a guy with the camera. And I said you know, you need someone to do it. And then her words were, you know, just take the effing photo bro. It was like, you know, so, so yeah, so she's doing, she does a lot of sort of charity work. Now she always worked in prisons and now does a lot of work with like troubled teens and that sort of stuff. So she's a tough warrior lady. So that's why once again, I called it like the name the kaha, which is, you know, for that warrior spirit. So yeah, that's, that's kind of the photo. So it's really sort of, you know, an emotional thing. And it's, you know, done quite a bit for me in my life. And I think Ricky and her. So the journey's been quite spectacular I must say.