The Camera and Beyond is an exhibition of photographs by a group of young people and the interpretation of their work by artists working in other media.

No Man is an Island was founded by a group of artists and craftspeople who live with autism in their families. They are developing exhibitions to support and show the creative lives of families who live with so-called ‘hidden disabilities’. The work is not defined by any individual’s personal challenges but is an expression of who they are, whether they be a professional artist, a person with living with disability, or both.

The Camera and Beyond is a collaboration between the young people, who are developing skills through photography, and the professional artists. The camera gives a particular freedom to explore the world and express the relationships between self and others to people whose lives may be filled with overwhelming complexities. In this project the young people are developing their personal skills and creative engagement with the world we all live in.

This exhibition is part of a pilot Project funded by Awards for All and SEEDA. The No Man is an Island Project has been recognised as part of the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad through the Inspire programme.

Speaking on behalf of the group, Project Manager Melanie Swan said “Our work doesn’t begin with a focus on disability and how it can be expressed through Art. Instead, our starting point is Art and creative expression, which leads to exploring how unusual experiences of life are expressed in the lives of creative families.

“Photography has a profound practical and metaphorical resonance in the context of our work. We’ve been impressed by how the young people have responded to photography and the freedom it gives them to explore the world in ways which wouldn’t be open to them otherwise. The Lead Artists' interpretations of their photography reflect the imagery in a variety of other media. In this collaboration we’re supporting the young people to enhance their access to future opportunities by sharing their creative achievements and potential in a wider social arena.”

The No Man is an Island group is working to develop a growing collaboration with other artists and community groups across the South East, to curate a regional exhibition for showing in London in 2012, which will include works from this exhibition.

Julian Bell and Tom Walker are two longstanding friends both living in Sussex. Both are fulltime professional artists with a dedicated sense of craftsmanship. After decades of work, both have now gained high profiles - though each in a slightly unorthodox way.

Tom Walker specializes in exploring the possibilities of soft pastels. He brings to them a feel for surrealism and European art as well as a very British humour and eccentricity. 'As each image that I make in this way gels or crystallises,' he says, 'it seems to me that it is like a glimpse through a window or a doorway, either looking into or out of a space, a room perhaps in a house with infinite rooms, each one different, containing unexpected, enigmatic, amusing or disturbing elements or experiences.'

Tom has become best known however for another aspect of his pastel work - his series Snooker In The Frame, a wildly inventive and often hilarious set of variations upon the snooker table. Tom is also exhibiting work from a new series, devoted to the art of the dance.

Julian Bell by contrast works in oils and from observation - his work is unmistakably in the realist tradition. Many of the pictures he is exhibiting are fast, urgent studies from the life, whether they are landscapes or figures. Julian devises exceptionally wide-angled panoramas and invents complex, often irony-laden narratives. As he explains it, 'Various untrue stories and a large imaginary bar seem to have
marched in and taken over my studio lately. But for those who prefer plain fact, I'm still painting plenty of slices of everyday normality - roadworks, shopping malls and throngs of naked women.'

In the past few years Julian has taken his panoramic interests abroad, to places such as Iran, India and Russia, mainly for research for Mirror of the World, a 500-page global history of art published by Thames & Hudson in 2007 and critically acclaimed as 'irresistible' and 'tremendous'. Julian's writing on art also appears in The Guardian, the London Review of Books and the New York Review of Books.

Tom's work can be seen at www.tommwalker.co.uk; Julian's at www.jbell.co.uk
Julian Bell appears by courtesy of the Francis Kyle Gallery and St Anne's Galleries.

Born in Canada in 1962, Mary Weinberger now lives in Cambridgeshire. She has been a photographer for two decades, and with a background in the Arts and education she
has enjoyed teaching photography for 15 years.

Mary's work is often influenced by paintings. This most recent series of pinhole images entitled ‘Domestic Memorabilia’ was inspired by the still life paintings of Giorgio Morandi.

Mary is captivated by the simplicity of the process of making pinhole photographs.
Recording on colour film, she produces images with colours that are saturated and soft at the same time.

The subjects which she chooses to record are familiar, everyday objects: a wind up toy, a fish bowl, or a bar of soap. However they are transformed in her compositions,
suggesting narratives that cause the viewer to question.

To see more of Mary’s work go to www.maryweinbergerphotography.co.uk

Two schools on the Isle of Wight, Medina High and St George’s Special Needs School, have collaborated on an exciting new photography project, the results of which will be on display at Dimbola.

The theme of this exhibition celebrates creativity, encouraging the students to think outside of the box and exploring the processes of the Camera Obscura.

This project has been funded by Aim Higher, an organisation promoting higher education for young people. In this instance the project has helped to ignite an interest in the art of photography, bringing to light new talent which it is hoped will go on to flourish and aim even higher.