R Number

With the Covid-19 pandemic we find ourselves unexpectedly living in an age where body temperature has assumed a new set of implications: we’re all potential carriers and spreaders of the virus. The world as we’ve always known it has instead become a strange and unsettling series of lockdowns, restrictions and new routines involuntarily placed on our everyday lives. The implementation of technology and science to find manageable ways to control, and ultimately combat Covid-19, has been profound, including the increased use of thermal cameras.

My work explores the boundary between conceptualism and photojournalism (experimental photojournalism), this includes using different types of lens based technology for effective visual storytelling.

© Giles Price - Image from the R Number photography project
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Londoners relax while social distancing during the Covid-19 pandemic in Greenwich Park, London, with the National Maritime Museum and towers of Canary Wharf on the city skyline.

© Giles Price - Image from the R Number photography project
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A pupil has their temperature taken on entering school, part of Covid-19 control measures at the L’Ecole de Battersea - an English-French bilingual preparatory school in South London, UK.

© Giles Price - Image from the R Number photography project
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27th June 2020, BLM supporters for Shukri Abdi march along Whitehall, London, while crowds also gathered in Manchester and Liverpool. It had been a year since the 12 year old Somalian refugee drowned in the River Irwell. Greater Manchester Police said they were treating Shurki's death as a "tragic incident". The Police watchdog investigated complaints about the way the force handled the case said her family were treated less favourably because of their ethnicity. During the pandemic the inequailties within society have again been highlighted.

© Giles Price - Image from the R Number photography project
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The eerliy empty streets around the Royal Exchange and financial towers in the City of London. The Bank of England estimates that the pandemic will cause Britain's worst recession in almost 300 years.

© Giles Price - Image from the R Number photography project
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A worker at a construction site in Olympia, London, stands inside a modular screening unit as a thermal camera takes his temperature before he's allowed to enter the site.

© Giles Price - Image from the R Number photography project
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During the first UK lockdown homeless people were given emergency accommodation, this funding ran out in June and people returned to the streets along with more made homeless by job losses. Here, in front of the National Gallery, London, homeless people queue to receive food from a mobile van run by NishkamSWAT, a Sikh welfare and awareness charity who help the disadvantaged in society.

© Giles Price - Image from the R Number photography project
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A participant in the Oxford University and AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine trial, receives a refrigerated injection by a member of staff from the Vaccine Institute, St George’s, University of London and St George’s University Hospitals NHS Trust.

© Giles Price - Image from the R Number photography project
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Police stand guard at the enterance to 10 Downing Street, London. The UK government like lots of others has struggled to contain the pandemic, nowhere is safe from infection, with Prime Minster Boris Johnson himself being hospitalised after catching the virus.

© Giles Price - Image from the R Number photography project
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Since the start of the pandemic there have been over 60 changes to lockdown restrictions in the UK. This has lead to confusion over how and what people are allowed to do. Here people enjoy drinks next to the River Lee, Hackney Wick, London, while trying to maintain social distancing.

© Giles Price - Image from the R Number photography project
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During the first UK lockdown, a quarter of British adults said the felt lonely, which rasied concerns about longterm mental health risks. Research by the Mental Health Foundation found that the worst affected were those aged 18-24 of which 44% expressed that the feeling of loneliness had impacted on their mental health. A lone figure walks through the Barbican Estate in London.

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