Hello London #3 - Interview with photographer Chloe Sheppard

With a passion for roses, Lana del Rey and the endless charm of vintage Americana, Chloe Sheppard is one of the most exciting young photographers in Instagram's vast artistic scenario.

Chloe is a 19 year-old self-taught photographer devoted to 35mm film rolls who’s been calling the attention of brands and well-known magazines in the past few months thanks to her dreamy and natural (read: photoshop-free) aesthetic, which perfectly harmonise with that current of visual art championed by fourth wave feminists: an ode to girliness, with a high rate of frills, mirrors, glitters, records and nostalgic atmospheres.

Last weekend I caught up in Shoreditch with Chloe, to have a chat around photography, Instagram and ‘Tumblr feminism’.

Chloe Sheppard. Ph. Francesca Milano

#1 How did you first get into photography?

I always took a little camera to school and used to take pictures of my friends at lunchtime. My bestfriend’s dad was a photographer, I was around her house and I was taking photos of her cat and he let me borrow one of his cameras, I shot a super close-up photo and I was just really impressed. Since then I used to take pictures of flowers, set up jewelry and stuff in my room sort of arty and took pictures that way. When I moved to film, then I started taking pictures of people and it just went on since then.

#2 Where do you draw inspiration from?

I watch a film and see a scene and I’d be like ‘Oh, that look so good, I wanna try to incorporate that to my photography’. Like Dazed & Confused, that’s so 70s and I just want my work to look like that film! Music as well. Most of the times I’d be listening to a song and I picture a video in my head along with it. Videos are something I wanna go into, but pictures are easier for me so I try to translate the lyrics to a picture and form a project around it. Sometimes I add quotes from lyrics to my photos as well. It’s just kind of like creating a dream world, so it’s lyrics, pictures, everything that goes in it. I’ll find people I want to use for the shoot and pitch the idea to them. With Instagram it’s so good, if I don’t know anyone that fits my idea I’ll just ask on it if anyone’s interested. People respond, people wanna be involved with everything.

#3 You’re also really inspired by the US.

All the movies I watch are 70s movies that are all in America. America now is much of a dream to me as it was back in the 70s, or how it was shown in the 70s. Everything I love is in America, so I feel like it’s just a part of me that’s there. Living in New York is my all time dream. I went last year and I met with friends. That’s where most of my best pictures come from. That trip changed everything.

#4 Your friend Sylvie is in many of your pictures. How did you meet her?

I saw Sylvie on Instagram last year and messaged her saying I really wanted to shoot together. So we set it up, we shot in a rose garden. She was 15 at the time! We have a lot of the same ideas and I don’t really have many people like that. That’s why we shoot so much, cause we just get along, we know what we like. She’s probably one of my only muses. I think we’ve done like 10 shoots, and now brands, like Me & You, contact me asking specifically for me to shoot Sylvie.

#5 Did you have other collaborations born through Instagram?

Most of the things I’ve done have been through Instagram. For me it’s been everything that started my career. I shot with Adidas, and magazines contact me cause of my Instagram. It’s kind of sad because now I have a few thousands followers people are willing to shoot with me, whereas before, when I had like 500, nobody would shoot with me cause they’d be like ‘You’re nobody’. It’s kind of shallow. So many times I was like ‘I should just give up posting my photos’, but you get there in the end and it’s worth it.

#6 You’re part of a platform ‘for girls by girls’, Girlfriends Gallery. How did that come about?

Me and Ashley [ Armitage], were following each other on Instagram for ages. When she formed it she asked me to feature my work there and then it grew from there. There’s so many good artists in there! It’s not that they’re trying to be against boys, it’s just that they’re trying to have a dedicated space just for girls, cause there’s not enough.

#7 I wanted to get there, cause there’s been a lot of arguing around this so called ‘Tumblr feminism’, about the fact that the images promoted are basically all teenage girls, with a Lolita-esque feeling, and glitter, and pink… Many people complain it’s become more of a trend and wonder why there’s still so many girls-only platforms, excluding men from the conversation. What do you think about that?

People just like to find things to moan about. There’s so many places where guys can put out their art work, it’s just they’re choosing to get mad at the one single project that doesn’t do that. I can see it from people’s point of view, but if guys were in it and it was like ‘Girls and Boyfriends Gallery’, it would just be like any other project. Magazines are both female and male, there’s so many things… The past few years for female artists, especially young social media artists, have become so important. We just wanna help each other any way we can. It’s a real community, there’s no rivalry, no jealousy. I think it’s such a positive thing.