City University journalism lecturers Rosie Waterhouse and Paul Anderson’s ‘ideological contradictions expose their conscious ignorance, and some may say, out right hatred for the Islamic way of life and all Muslims’ according to a statement by City University’s Islamic Society (ISoc).

In response to a comment piece written by senior lecturer Rosie Waterhouse published in The Independent, which had already caused some controversy, as well as  a blog post by colleague Paul Anderson the ISoc claims Waterhouse and  Anderson ‘do not want to understand or discuss the Islamic way of life’.

The statement titled: Secularism is not Islamophobia, but Secularists are Islamophobic ends with something of a challenge to the soon to be  new vice-chancellor Professor Paul Curran:

It is time the ISoc stands up, defends itself and fights back against the likes of Ms Waterhouse and Mr Anderson; two confused secularists that promote significantly preposterous views. So where do we go from here? Well, a new vice-chancellor is due to take over in August, indeed it will be a brave vice-chancellor who confronts this issue.

The students’ union elections have brought out the dark side of its candidates as one falsely accused another of disliking Muslims.

Presidential candidate Kunaal Khemlani, from the CityZens slate, has been accused by education vp candidate Rezaul Islam, from Team Edge, of disliking Muslims.

Rumours are circulating around the university that Rezaul has been telling potential voters not to select Khemlani because he does not like Muslims. According to the SU election rules any accusations made about another candidate must be made to the students’ union body in writing.

Khemlani says: “I have heard the allegations but I have not yet made any formal complaints.”
Emelie Helsen, students’ union advocacy manager, said: “There are a lot of rumours circulating at the moment and candidates have been pointing fingers at each other but there have been no formal complaints.”

She added: “We have an election policy that no candidates can involve themselves in negative campaigning.” Islam has denied making the comments.
The Team Edge have also been criticised for falsely claiming support from the media team and the Hindu Society. The Hindu Society and media team have given their support to NUS delegate Kahleda Boshir, who is part of Team Edge. However, they did not give their support to the whole Team Edge.

Khemlani says: “We feel the Team Edge slate should make a public retraction, for falsely claiming that they are being supported by the media team and Hindu Society.”

The CityZens slate have not been entirely free of controversy. They have come under criticism for the offensive slogans on their campaign posters. One slogan reads “Don’t be a punnani, vote for Khemlani” while another states “Don’t be a nipple, vote for Sipple”.

Voting opened on Wednesday  March 24 and closed on Wednesday March 31.

Go to www.culsu.co.uk for results.

The analysis by Grant Thornton accounts shows that the highest amount paid out by an institution was £651,000 from City University. As revealed by the Inquirer in January, £393,000 of this was part of a “was compensation for loss of office” when he resigned his post last summer.

The University of East London (UEL) had the second highest outgoings paying out a total of £537,000

Despite funding cuts of £900m which threaten up to 14,000 academic posts vice-chancellors pay rose by 10.6% last year. According to the study, on average, vice-chancellors were paid £207,318 in 2008/09. It is yet to be revealed the pay agreement for incoming vice-chancellor Paul Curran, but former VC Gillies was paid a salary of £393,000, almost double the national average. This had risen from £227,000 in the previous academic year showing a pay increase of 73 per cent.

Andrew Likierman of the London Business School had the highest salary alone at £427,000.

The following PDF shows the figures in full:

Vice-chancellors’ annual pay and benefits, 2008-09 and average salary of full-time academic staff, 2008-09

City’s new vice-chancellor has been accused of creating a “climate of fear and intimidation” in his current post at Bournemouth University.

Pic: sheffield.ac.uk

It was announced in March that Professor Paul Curran, who has been VC at Bournemouth for five years, will begin at City in August.

News of his departure has been welcomed by the University and College Union at Bournemouth.

A spokesman for the UCU said Prof Curran’s legacy would be a “climate of fear and intimidation which had a devastating impact on staff morale.

“Under Professor Curran 150 staff lost their jobs, students became increasingly critical of teaching arrangements, and employment relations hit an all time low.

“The union believes that Prof Curran’s departure is an ideal opportunity to reverse many of the disastrous changes wrought under his leadership.”

However, Prof Curran has said the changes have increased the university’s “strength, stature and popularity”.

Alan Frost, the university board chairman said: “His leadership has been pivotal in raising the profile of the university nationally and internationally.”

A Bournemouth University (BU) spokesperson said: “Under Prof Curran’s leadership, an environment has been created at BU where staff and students are attaining new standards of achievement.”

Despite the university achieving a series of successes, with rises in league tables and high research ratings, the UCU and Bournemouth University students’ union (BUSU) have repeatedly expressed discontent.

In October 2007, BUSU passed a vote of no confidence in Prof Curran. The UCU followed suit in April 2008, delivering a damning 93.4 per cent in favour of the no confidence vote.

Curran’s time at Bournemouth has been plagued by controversy. He caused outrage among staff in 2007 when he criticised the teaching at Bournemouth and suggested it was the university’s coastal location that attracted students to it.

Staff refused to back Curran’s comments. At the time, Kevin Maloney, chair of the Bournemouth UCU said: “This feels like a body blow against us by our own VC.

“Academics here can take criticism, but this is public ridicule. It’s a kick in the teeth for Bournemouth University and coming from the most unexpected source.”

Although BU’s standing in the league tables have improved dramatically, the university has been accused of artificially inflating marks.

In 2008, Professor Paul Buckland won a case for constructive dismissal after resigning in protest when the university overruled his decision to fail students.

Despite failing the initial and re-sit examinations, a senior staff member intervened to award pass marks to 14 students.

Andrew Lack, the honorary secretary of the City University UCU committee said: “We have contacted Bournemouth local branch because we felt we needed to understand their comments. We are prepared for someone with a background of cutting jobs and being more adversarial.”

The president of City UCU, John Saunders, said: “I know nothing about the man. I hope he’s learnt from his experience at Bournemouth and is ready to work willingly with staff in a positive manner.”

On the news of his appointment, Prof Curran said: “This appointment is a unique privilege. I am delighted to be joining an academically strong and distinctive university that has the enviable advantage of being an integral part of a world city.

“It offers me a unique opportunity to work closely with many highly talented staff and students and lead City University London as it takes its place among the world’s leading professional universities.”

Apurv Bagri, pro-chancellor of City, said: “Council is delighted to have appointed a VC with such a successful track record in leadership, management and also in his academic discipline. We look forward to working together with Paul to deliver on a strong vision for City.”

A matter of honour

Since the American invasion in 2003, Iraqi women have fallen victims of sectarian violence. A recent report by the Observer shows that victims of “honour killings” increased by 70 per cent in Basra, from 47 in 2007 to 81 in 2008, and yet a lot goes unreported. Huda, 21, from Basra speaks for the first time about her experience witnessing her sister’s abduction and honour killing. Basma Rose reports.

“Yasmine was not only my sister, she was like my mother, my best friend. Everything. I still remember the day she was kidnapped. I want to forget it, but I can’t. September 2005. I was 17-years-old and Yasmine was only 19. That’s when it all happened.

My mother had cooked food for my uncle and his wife who lived just across the road from us. They had just got married, and my mother sent Yasmine to take the food to them. Yasmine did as she was told, but a minute or two after she left, all I heard was gun shots. A group of men came into our neighbourhood, all who had their faces covered, and they were just shooting whoever they saw. I fell to the ground because it sounded so near. I went underneath the table.

My mother came running into the room I was in and hid underneath the table with me. Holding me. All she kept saying was ‘Yasmine is outside. Yasmine is out there.’ I couldn’t speak. I was crying because I feared for the same thing. I could feel my mother’s heart beating so fast and that was making me feel even more nervous. We were hearing men and women scream outside, and the more screaming we heard the more we held on to each other and the more we cried. I couldn’t bare to hear anymore so I put my hands over my ears, but I still heard everything. I just hoped my sister was safe. That she was hiding somewhere. That nothing had happened to her.

“The relief I felt knowing my sister was alive did not last for long. My father dropped to the floor. ‘My honour,’ he kept shouting. ‘These people have taken our honour.’”

All of a sudden the shooting stopped, but the screaming continued. We heard the front door get knocked down but it was only my father and my uncle. As soon as we heard them calling for our names, me and my mother both went running to them. The first thing my mother asked my uncle: ‘Did Yasmine make it to your house.’ She was holding on to his clothes and shaking him, she wanted an immediate answer, but my uncle said she didn’t come. At that moment my heart fell to the ground. My chest felt so tight, I felt as though I couldn’t breathe anymore. My head was spinning. I just watched my parents run outside with my uncle to see if they could find her. But I stood still.

Eventually, I found the courage and walked to the front door. I went outside to see the worst sight of my life. My neighbour’s child had been shot in the head. He laid there, blood just coming out from him. His mother was just screaming. He was only six. I ran back inside and locked the door and ran straight into my room which I shared with Yasmine. I sat in her bed, hugging my knees, and crying. I just wanted to see her again. I wanted her to be safe. Alive.

It had gotten dark, and I started to get worried about my parents. The police and an ambulance were outside by then, but I was still scared that another raid was going to happen. I heard the door open and I just jumped out of my sister’s bed and ran to the front door hoping to see her.

But I didn’t. It was only my parents and my two older brothers who were at my [other] uncle’s house. I knew from the look on their face, she was dead.

We did not go to sleep at all that night. I don’t think anyone in the neighbourhood did. But it was around five or six in the morning my brother noticed a letter that came through the door. We didn’t know when exactly it came through, but he read the letter and shouted: ‘Yasmine’s alive!’ I ran to him crying and laughing hysterically. The relief I felt knowing my sister was alive did not last for long. He read the letter out loud to all of us, and my father dropped to the floor. ‘My honour,’ he kept shouting. ‘These people have taken our honour.’ My mother kept hitting her head against the wall. I just stood still watching the two strongest people I know, destroyed.

My sister was kidnapped and the criminals wanted a $10,000 ransom to give her back. She was kidnapped because she was a Shia Muslim. They did not target her specifically. We are a Shia neighbourhood. Those people knew that whoever they got their hands on is not a Sunni. My parents had 48 hours to get the money and put it in a bag outside the back door of the mosque that was ten minutes away from our house. My mother gave all that she owned to my father, and my father sold everything. Everything we owned, and with the help of my uncles, we had $10,000 dollars ready. My father and uncles went to where they were told in the letter, on a Thursday, and we just waited.

Those two days were the longest days of my life. It felt longer than two days. According to my brothers, people started talking about my sister. They were wondering why she was not at home and assumed that she had run away. My brothers got into a few fights and really hurt themselves for defending Yasmine. Respectable girls live with their parents until they are married. They are not allowed to stay the night outside their parent’s house or anyone not related. They did not understand that she was kidnapped. They asked questions we did not know the answer to. Why did they kidnap Yasmine? Why just Yasmine and not Huda? Ignorance, that’s what it was. I was so angry at them. By not supporting us through a difficult time, instead they made it worse. My father did not speak a word for those two days, and neither did my mother. They just waited, and so did I.

“My father told her to stop talking. Gradually his voice got louder, and that’s when I wished my sister had died during the raid rather than suffer this”

My sister finally appeared. When my brother opened the door, my sister did not look like my sister. Her face was destroyed. It was clear that she was beaten up. Her cheek looked as if it was going to explode because it was that swollen. You could hardly see her beautiful hazel eyes because of the bruise around it. She was hurt really, really bad. My brother got her inside not saying a word to her. I didn’t understand his reaction. I was so happy to see her I cried and ran to hug her. She pushed me away and ran to our room. She lay on her bed shivering. My parents came running after her and they were shocked to see the state of her. My father had tears in his eyes and came closer and closer to her. He pulled her up to hug her first and she just let her tears pour out. She kept saying to him: ‘I swear it wasn’t my fault.’ My mother just looked at her as if disgusted to see her alive.

My father asked her what had happened and she told him everything. She told him that she went out as my mother asked her to take some food to my uncle’s house. She was about to cross the road and a car came driving at a very fast speed and started to shoot at her. She ran as fast as she could away from the car to come back home, but a man came running up towards her, caught her and got her in his car. He punched her until she was knocked out.

The next thing she knew she woke up in a house with three other girls. She didn’t know any. They were all crying for help until seven or eight men came into the room. She said they grabbed the girl sitting next to her by the hair and took her out with them. She and the other two girls fell silent. They could hear the other girl scream ‘get off me’. She kept screaming that repeatedly, and she had no idea what they were doing to the girl until a man grabbed her. Grabbed Yasmine.

She was dragged into the room where there was a mattress on the floor and the other girl laying there. Yasmine said the other girl was shaking so bad she thought she had been electrocuted. Yasmine said she was breathing so fast that she kept feeling her heart skip a beat. The men threw the other girl out of the room and pushed Yasmine onto the mattress. That’s when three men, three dirty men, raped my sister, my innocent sister, repeatedly. After they finished, Yasmine said they spat at her and kept beating her. Kicking her everywhere. Pulling her by the hair and banging her head against the wall. Yasmine said they kept laughing at her, thinking it was funny.

My father told her to stop talking. Gradually his voice got louder, and that’s when I wished my sister had died during the raid rather than suffer this. He got his belt and beat my sister. My mother told me to get out of the room because I tried to stop my dad. Everyone else was just watching which angered me. It wasn’t her fault! My brother dragged me by the hair and got me out of the room and locked the door behind him. I kept banging on the door, I wanted to help my sister. “Please don’t kill her dad,” I kept shouting. Eventually, I heard nothing. My brother opened the door and slapped me so hard across my face I felt my cheeks burn. “You don’t say a word to no one about this you understand.” My mother said the same thing as she walked out with tears running down her face.

I watched my father sit next to my sister’s body. His belt was around her neck. He just cried. I was hysterical. I held my sister’s body so tight against mine. I hugged her. That’s all I wanted to do when she walked through the door. Hug her. Talk to her. Go back to normal. Like the past two days had never happened. But it just wasn’t as easy as that.

The way our [Iraqi] society thinks is that if a girl gets raped, she brings shame to the family and should be killed. My sister didn’t mean to bring shame to our family. She did not deserve to get killed. She is yet another victim of the war that has shattered my family. I wish society would see it like that. See my sister as an innocent victim that deserved a second chance.”

Some of the names have been changed to protect identity.

City’s dean of students, Dr Malcolm Cross has admitted to innapropriate behaviour, including offering oral sex to a colleague and gesturing towards his crotch at a business dinner.

A hearing conducted by the Health Professions Council (HPC) conlcluded that Cross made lewd sexual suggestions to his male colleage and was also rude and condescending to a female colleague but cleared him of professional misconduct.

During the two-day hearing which began on March 15, colleague Owen Hughes, who is also an alumnus of City, gave evidence against his former lecturer.  Molly Ross, from the British Psychological Society (BPS) and another colleague Simon Parritt, also gave evidence.

pic: http://www.hpc-uk.org/

Cross is a council member of the HPC, which held the hearing to determining his fitness to practice as a psychologist. The details were removed from the HPC website upon Cross’ request; however, the Inquirer has obtained the transcript from the hearing.

The hearing, which began on March 15, is in relation to an evening in June 2009 where a meeting and dinner took place prior to a BPS accreditation visit to the University of West England in which Cross was acting as chair.

Both Hughes and Ross alleged that Cross was drunk when he arrived at the meeting and encouraged colleagues to cut the meeting short before suggesting they move on to a restuarant. Hughes says that during dinner Cross was sexually suggestive toward waiting staff and discussed his troubled personal life.

Hughes told the hearing: “He told me that he loved me and asked me to kiss him repeatedly and attempted to kiss me.” Hughes says that Cross then offered him oral sex before leaning back in his chair and rubbing his crotch.  Mr Hughes said: “It made me feel very uncomfortable. It was clear that his behaviour was very unprofessional.”

Molly Ross, from the British Psychological Society, said Cross also threatened to expose himself when Hughes spurned his advances. She said “as both the night and his drunkeness progressed Cross became more and more sexually innapropriate.”

Another colleague, Simon Parritt, was also subject to   Cross’ advances. He also attempted to kiss Parritt and says Cross rubbed his inner thigh. Parritt tried to laugh off his behaviour but his wife, who was also present, was “not impressed”.

Cross was also accused by all present of being “belittling and picking on” Ross throughout the night. Hughes said: “He constantly insinuated that Molly Ross was being a ‘spoilsport’ and made a big show of paying for the wine himself as Molly, quite rightly, had to keep an eye on the BPS budget.”

David Tyme, the solicitor acting on behalf of Cross commented during the case: “It is quite clear than on balance this was a bad joke gone wrong and he overstepped the mark.” Cross apologised to Molly Ross and argued his actions were lighthearted and not meant to be threatning.

The panel agreed that Cross had been rude and condescending towards Ross, had been inebriated, had made lewd gesture towards his crotch and made reference to oral sex. They believed it was an isolated incident, and although his behaviour was innapropriate his fitness to practice as a psychologist was not impaired.

Hughes agreed, saying “Cross appeared sober, although he smelled of vomit and stale alcohol. He performed perfectly well.”

Cross has declined to comment  further on the situation. Beverly Alton,  press officer for City University said: “Malcolm Cross underwent an HPC hearing relating to an alleged incident June 2009, which took place away from the University. The hearing concluded the allegation was not well founded.”

City’s deputy pro-chancellor (vice chair) is under investigation by Ofcom for allegedly taking bribes from the Scottish government.

Rob Woodward allegedly had “secret meetings” with Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond last year to discuss what has been branded “cash for programmes”.

pic: city.ac.uk

Woodward is the chief executive of STV, the Scottish branch of ITV, which supposedly offered to explore “working for the benefit of the Scottish government”.

Documents obtained by the Scottish Sunday Express under the Freedom of Information Act show that they had an “interesting and productive dialogue” at a meeting at STV headquarters last year.

Ofcom is now investigating STV as part of its standards and complaints procedure. An Ofcom spokesman said the exchange raised “enough issues to merit an investigation,” but added that this did not necessarily imply guilt.

The regulator could claim back five per cent of advertising revenue if STV is found to have broken its rules on editorial independence. An STV spokesman said: “These allegations are baseless and inaccurate. STV is impartial and maintains a close engagement with all political parties.”

STV’s financial problems have been well documented. They reported a 55 per cent decline in profits for 2009 and Woodward was forced to take a 40 per cent pay cut.

As the deputy pro-chancellor, Woodward is the third most senior member of the university council, which is responsible for finance amongst other  functions.

A senior lecturer has caused controversy amongst students after calling for the niqab to be banned in universities.

Rosie Waterhouse, (right) director of the MA in Investigative Journalism, wrote an article in the Independent on City University’s Islamic Society.

Her views on the niqab, a veil that fully covers the face and is worn by many Muslim City students, sparked a debate on campus. She said: “I think the niqab should be banned at university.”

She added: “I was particularly disturbed by the sight of Muslim female students wearing the niqab, a dress statement I find offensive and threatening.”

Waterhouse also argued that the niqab is a symbol of oppression. She said: “Don’t they value the rights and freedoms they enjoy in Britain? In Taliban strongholds in Afghanistan they are forced to cover up and denied an education.

“One of my journalism students, who is a Muslim woman, interviewed four British-born Muslim girls who said they began to wear the niqab only after coming to City and joining the Islamic Society. They found it ‘liberating’, they said.”

In the article, which discussed the university’s Muslim prayer room dispute, Waterhouse said she was “concerned” at the activity of the ISoc. She referenced The Islamist author, Ed Husain, among other researchers, who have suggested that City is “a potential recruiting ground for violent extremists.”

She has received heavy criticism posted online and in the journalism department, including some calling for her to be sacked. Others have defended the article for making a stand.

She said: “I stand by the article, which was a comment piece expressing my personal opinion based on genuine concerns, and look forward to hearing the voice of moderate Muslims in any future debate.”

Seher Mahmood, one of Waterhouse’s students, said: “I totally understand that she’s entitled to her opinion, but because she has that academic status as a lecturer, she’s in danger of promoting things she might not mean. If a person said they find part of someone’s religion “offensive and threatening”, then I’d lose respect for them because of that.”

Peter Newlands, BA Journalism, said: “No community, whether religious or cultural, is immune to criticism. Rosie Waterhouse criticised a community and asked them to defend their values and policies. Sometimes people have to defend their beliefs if they are contradictory to another’s.”

“Money” by Shunt, at 42-44 Bermondsey Street
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To find performance-collective Shunt’s show “Money”, you have to pass one of the tunnels behind London Bridge. It’s dark and humid. Fading techno beats are streaming out from an underground nightclub as girls covered in goosebumps are waiting with anticipation in a firm line, supervised by a burly, bitter-looking security guard.

It all looks very much like a normal Saturday night in central London. As you keep walking the drumming music slowly fades away, and as you step into an old tobacco warehouse another sound is heard – this time it’s that of a needle moving on an old dusty French vinyl. The norm and mentality of your daily flow has all of a sudden changed direction – you’ve entered the imaginary myriad world of Shunt, an experience of unexpected events. Normal rules won’t apply here. Leave the workload at home. Forget the phone bills you have to pay or your the ever-growing pile of dirty washing rotting in your sink.

Leave whoever you are behind and let the Shunt collective show you a place where dystopia and utopia meet and create excellent surrealism that borders on the all-too-real. Shunt wants the viewer to be as much of a participant as a performer, so as soon as you step into the three-storey ‘machinery’ building, a creation similar to French directors Jean Pierre Jeunet and Marco Caro’s imaginary cinematography in ‘The city of the lost children’ or ‘the Delicates’ . Shunt will throw you into the most remarkable sceneries. The show is loosely based on French Writer Emile Zola’s L’Argent, a masterpiece that carries very similar threads to our own credit crunch.

As you enter the show,all you can hear for a few minutes is hunting beats that make your heart jump while standing closely to the other audience members in total darkness – you are covered and exposed at the same time in artistic nothingness.


The installation draws on Miroslaw Balka’s previous ‘box of darkness’ held at the Tate Modern (13th of October 2009 – 5th of April 2010) where every step into the unknowing dark questioned your own fears: “Where light is used I use dark”, Balka says. In a way that is exactly how Shunt use the lack of awareness as a tool to neutralize the mind and to fully accept the change of the participant’s perception of time and space. Money is finishing on the 27th of March but expect more to come from the collective, as their ideas are endless: “We wanted to build a leaking water pipe in front of the machine so it would look like it was raining while people had a beer before the show” says Nahum Mantra, one of Shunt’s members, “but at the end we had to give it up. We never figured out how to make it look quite real so we’ll save it for the next show”.

Shunt will play with your mind; move around, beneath and above you. Rarely have different dilemmas of human nature been described in such a mesmerising way. This surreal vision is a blend of real imagination with genius directing, impressive visual stunts and outstanding performances.

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Money by Shunt

42-44 Bermondsey Street

London Bridge SE 1 3UD

Contact number – 020 737 819 52

7:30 (Door opens at 6:30) Tuesday to Saturday

21:45 (Door opens at 21:00) Friday to Saturday

£20 per ticket

Performance lasts about 90 minutes

Victoria Miro Gallery, N1

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It’s probably safe to assume that William Eggleston isn’t very interested in people as photographic subjects. There are a total of two visible human beings depicted in his new exhibition of photographs taken over the last decade, and only in one case can we see their face. Eggleston is keener on showing man-made environments, artefacts, artificially created surroundings, than zooming in on our limbs and faces. One reason might be that it is more challenging and good-old fashioned fun to look out for the curious visual compositions created by the interaction of objects – a few abandoned light-blue cushions, leaning against a purple wall marked by graffiti, for example.

In any case, Eggleston, who, back in the sixties, was one of the first snappers who used colour photography in an artistic context, is a master in the art of fitting intriguing, multi-faceted and always colourful scenes into his camera frame. One of these scenes is captured in a photo called “Untitled (Red Dumpster, Orange Building, Memphis)” – all his images are named “Untitled”, along with a list of the main objects in brackets, but there is always more to Eggleston’s pictures than the title suggests. In this case, it’s the way the sunlight infuses the main colours – the red of the dumpster and the orange of the surrounding walls – with a vibrancy that makes you almost feel the Southern heat and smell the stench fleeing from the gawping container.

The sunlight plays an important role in the pictures on display. There is a spartanic image of what looks like a public toilet in Cuba, with its greying, unremarkable walls and tiles. Yet, to the right of the frame, the pink and yellow curtains are being shaken by the wind and sunlight coming through the window, thus softening the blow of a somewhat dingy and sparse first impression. Elsewhere, the sun dips a derelict wooden windowsill, rusty nails and frayed edges included, into a lovely, soothing light – the silver spoon reflecting this light is the cherry on top.

Eggleston very lovingly and carefully explores the day-to-day, seemingly mundane scenery in which we move – roads, the rooms in our house, motels and shops – and takes pleasure in capturing details such as the bright packaging of “Piggly Wiggly” crackers, a weird collection of vintage lamps decorated with porcelain figurines or the way an American flag hangs lifelessly outside a New Jersey motel at night.

His infatuation with the sometimes careless, sometimes quirky way we arrange or deface our possessions and our surroundings leads to some images that look like they have been set up – such as the one showing an old, withered newspaper lying on the grass. There is a photograph within the photograph – the picture on the page lying face up – whose colour harmonises so effortlessly with the blooming leaves of the plant next to it that almost looks like it had been intentionally placed there.

Eggleston has become known for the “democratic” use of his camera – there is no object unworthy of his attention. As for human subjects: they may not be the focus of his pictures, but their essence is tangible in every one of them.

21^st Century is at the Victoria Miro Gallery (16 Wharf Road, off City Road) until 27^th February. Entry is free.