Alison Radcliffe By Jack Radcliffe

Radcliffe’s candid portraits of friends, family, acquaintances, carefully composed and richly printed, seem to meet the definition of documentary photography. ...his images are, in fact, powerful challenges to that definition, as he pushes his use of the photograph as a document. Unlike the cold, objective, observational nature often characteristic of this kind of photography, Radcliffe approaches his subjects with an unavoidable compassion and insight. With his sensitivity towards his subjects, the layer of textures he finds with his camera lens, and the richness of tone he achieves with his skillful printing, his portraits mesmerize us with their depth and world-worn vulnerability and innocence.
Radcliffe’s approach to the people he photographs is essential to understanding the results he achieves with his final images. His photographs, usually produced as a series of images made over a span of time, offer the complex relation to time we experience only with still photography. They also allow us as viewers to experience the intimacy that he achieves with his subjects, as a result of his long-term, often single-minded commitment to them. He establishes an empathetic connection with them, finding in them and then capturing with his camera lens, their own compassion and place in life, and shares that with us. Through their faces and eyes which he manages sensitively to capture, we are allowed to view their souls; and whether we feel attracted or repulsed by the portraits, we are mesmerized by them, and they are committed to our visual memory.