Source: Graduate Photography Online 2025 - BA Selections

Each year as part of Graduate Photography Online we ask a number of professionals from the world of photography to review all the BA work submitted and choose their favourites. We hope this makes an interesting introduction to the project as a whole.

Reviewing this year’s BA Photography submissions has offered a valuable insight into how emerging practitioners are responding to the world around them. The breadth of topics, ranging from the intimately personal to broader global concerns, reflects a generation keen to engage with the complexities of contemporary life. It was heartening to see so many students actively experimenting with visual media and using photography as a tool for inquiry, critique, and self-expression. Visual literacy has never been more important, and it was particularly positive to see students addressing themes such as identity, gender, feminism, and the impact of capitalism with clarity and conviction. The range of approaches and perspectives, shaped by the diversity of courses nationwide, offers a valuable snapshot of emerging photographic voices in the UK today. I congratulate the students on their achievements and wish them all the very best for the future.

Selected Photographers:

Selector's Comment: What immediately caught my eye in Shizza Majeed’s Babaji’s Britain was the deep bond and trust between the artist and her grandfather, beautifully evident in their collaborative process. The portraits are made all the more powerful by the humour and subtle subversion of nationalist symbols like the St George’s flag. By reclaiming such iconic imagery, the work cleverly challenges contemporary stereotypes in the UK, and uses a gentle humour to communicate a personal narrative of belonging. This project is a tender yet pointed tribute, an act of resistance and love that redefines what it means to be British across generations.

Selector's Comment: Corporation Tax immediately stood out for its playful, fresh approach and sharp, quirky humour, paired with the boldness to challenge one of society’s most entrenched patriarchal institutions. Emily Roche centres women in the narrative, revealing the often invisible costs they’ve borne in the name of faith, duty, and social acceptance. Framing the Catholic Church as a corporate entity allows the work to cleverly expose the many layers of control it has exercised, not just financial, but over bodies, identities, and community belonging. With wit and cleverly constructed images, the work dismantles this network of influence, inviting reflection on complicity, resistance, and the personal strength it takes to step outside its grip.

Selector's Comment: Although initially drawn in by the elusive and temporally ambiguous images, what captured my attention in 'Phantom Mirror' was Eliza Stephens’ thoughtful process and innovative approach to such a deeply complex and emotionally charged subject. Using AI as a tool for phototherapy to clarify and externalise emotion, is an intriguing and original strategy. The project navigates the disorientation of dementia with sensitivity, transforming fragmentation and loss into a space for visual exploration. I was struck by how the work holds space for ambiguity and grief, using photography not to explain but to feel. It also prompted reflection on how care is structured and experienced, raising quiet but powerful questions about the systems we rely on, and how society values (or overlooks) the emotional labour of caregiving.

Selector's Comment: Although I haven’t experienced this work in person, it sparked my curiosity with the questions raised about our relationship with (and growing dependence on) technology. Moira’s exploration of the systems that are deeply embedded in our lives, yet often difficult to visualise, such as capitalism, technological obsolescence, and the commodification of memory, is particularly thoughtful. By using outdated technologies, the work not only critiques our culture of disposability but also conveys a quiet urgency - the need for human connection in an age where tools for communication are constantly replaced. These once-familiar objects become emotional artefacts, reminding us that memory is not just data, but something shared, held, and felt between people.

Selector's Comment: What drew me to Oscar Dooley’s project was its timely engagement with the current revaluation of archives, not as neutral repositories, but as constructed and often contentious spaces. Archaeological Evidence of Modern Material Culture cleverly plays with this idea, presenting everyday objects through a fictional lens that destabilises our sense of time and truth. By reframing familiar items as mysterious relics, the work asks us to consider how future narratives are shaped by the material traces we leave behind. It is a playful and imaginative take on how meaning is projected onto objects, and how archives can both reveal and obscure cultural understanding.

Selector's Comment: Anna Warin has created a deeply personal and powerful counter-narrative to the increasingly hostile and politicised debate around trans rights in the UK. Drawing from personal medical archives and lived experience, and employing a range of techniques, the work feels like part of an evolving and ongoing practice. At a time when legal protections are being eroded and access to gender-affirming care is under threat, this project feels both urgent and necessary. It offers a vital perspective from someone directly affected, communicating not abstract arguments but lived realities. This is an important contribution to a conversation that too often excludes those at its centre.