Shot by London based photographers, Jonathan Anderson and Edwin Low, The Athlete was first shown at the National Art Gallery of Malaysia to coincide with the 1998 Commonwealth Games. A selection of these photographs will show at the National Portrait Gallery Canberra as part of the celebration of the 2000 Olympic Games.
"The nicest comment I heard was from one of the athletes who said everything he felt inside when he was training he didn't think outsiders understood," said Anderson, "but he was amazed because he saw it on the wall".
Jonathan Anderson (b.1961) and Edwin Low (b. 1957) live and work in London and have collaborated as the photographic team Anderson & Low since 1990. Their photographic practice encompasses portraiture, street photography, architectural studies, landscapes, still life, athletes and sports subjects. Anderson & Low have worked predominantly in black and white including platinum-palladium printing techniques. In 1998 their exhibition The Athlete, a collection of 120 photographs which explores aspects of sporting life and the sporting ideal, was held at the National Art Gallery of Malaysia as part of the XVI Commonwealth Games cultural festival. The show is also touring to the US Olympic Museum this year. Their work has been acquired and exhibited by the National Portrait Gallery in London and widely exhibited in the United Kingdom, Australia, America and Malaysia. Their photograph of the millennium dome in London was commissioned as the official poster for the venue.
