Artes Mundi partners with Forma for A Perfect Sentence, the first UK solo exhibition by Oliver Frank Chanarin

Exploring the shifting terrain of documentary photography—our drive for attention, the complexity of being seen and our anxiety of being overlooked—A Perfect Sentence , commissioned and produced by Forma with eight partners, is Oliver Frank Chanarin’s first UK solo exhibition and will see multiple presentations across the country, public acquisitions, a digital platform and a publication.

Join Forma for the premiere at The Museum of Making, Derby on Thursday 16 March 2023, as part of the photography biennial FORMAT23.

Throughout 2022, Chanarin undertook multiple journeys across the UK, often finding himself on the margins - from suburban fetish groups, to carnival troupes in community halls, to gender activists protesting in the streets. His analogue camera became a tool for social exchange. Collaborative photoshoots gave way to chance encounters with strangers and friends, missteps and wilful attempts at getting lost in the world. The resulting photographs capture a subjective and intimate record of a nation in transition.

A Perfect Sentence evolved during a peculiar and unsettling time, when Brexit polarised the country, Covid-19 forced people into isolation and the public’s consciousness of identity politics heightened. This juncture coincided with the disbanding of Chanarin’s artistic partnership - the internationally acclaimed duo Broomberg & Chanarin - whose collaboration came to an end after working together for over twenty years. In response to these events, Chanarin took a cue from August Sander’s collective portrait of German society, People of the 20th Century (1927-64) and turned to the vernacular of documentary photography.