
The
Artist
Sarah Mei
Lives and Works in
Amsterdam
Sarah Mei Herman holds a BA in Photography from The Royal Academy of Art, The Hague, and an MA in Fine Art Photography from London’s Royal College of Art.
Her personal projects explore relationships, intimacy, loneliness, longing, and the human urge for physical proximity, often focusing on the vulnerability of transitory life stages.
Her work has been exhibited internationally, at institutions and festivals such as The National Portrait Gallery, London; The Benaki Museum, Athens; Photo Elysée, Lausanne; Le Château d’Eau, Toulouse; The Jewish History Museum, Amsterdam; and the JIMEI x ARLES International Photo Festival, Xiamen. Her projects have been recognised by a range of prizes and awards, including the Taylor Wessing Portrait Prize, the Hyères Festival of Fashion and Photography and the Arnold Newman Prize For New Directions in Photographic Portraiture. Her work is found in several public and private art collections, whilst her images have been published by the likes of iD, Vogue Italia, Foam Magazine, Paper Journal and Dear Dave. Herman’s second photo book – Julian & Jonathan – was recently published by the London-based GOST Books. Future 2025 exhibitions include solo shows at Concertgebouw Brugge in Belgium, and at GLAZ festival in Rennes, France.
Projects
2014
Touch
I started the Touch series in 2014, during a four-month artist residency in the Chinese coastal city of Xiamen. I was curious about the cultural differences I encountered there, but I really wanted to portray something universally recognisable: the meaning of friendship and love, in all its intensity and vulnerability. Meeting my subjects in Xiamen’s streets or at the university campus, I started photographing several young adults – primarily women – and their intimate relationships.
Many of the young women I met were in queer relationships. Whilst homosexuality is no longer prohibited by law in China, it remains a taboo across society, particularly amongst older generations. None of those I photographed have been able to speak openly with their parents about their sexual identities and preferences; I therefore feel privileged that each one was willing to share so much of their private world with me.
I’ve returned to Xiamen several times since 2014, and I try to photograph the same women on each visit – capturing the tenderness they share, and the things that have changed or remained over time. Fortuitously, three of those I first photographed in Xiamen have since moved to Europe, allowing me the opportunity to continue portraying them.
Sarah Mei
was nominated by
Hyères
in
2018
Show all projects
Each year every member of the FUTURES European Photography Platform nominates a set of artists and projects to become part of the FUTURES network.
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I’ve always loved photography, even if it sounds like a cliche. The first photos I took, I did without knowing how to do that, without paying any attention to framing, subject or composition. After a while, I began to understand what is happening in the space between me as a photographer and the subject I was photographing. And many years later, I also understood why I love to photograph. To communicate. A message, a concept, an emotion.
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