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Rankin Vs RANKIN

By Rankin. Images by Anya Campbell

11 Months Ago

“ When I first broached the idea of being a photographer, my Dad really thought I was crazy. In fact, he wouldn’t talk to me for a year.”

 

Rankin
Firstly, why do you work across so many different disciplines – photography, film, magazines, books, production and now you have an advertising agency?
RANKIN

I came from a working-class family who didn’t know anything about art. When I first broached the idea of being a photographer, my Dad really thought I was crazy. In fact, he wouldn’t talk to me for a year. However, if I hadn’t been brought up in a family that encouraged me to be inquisitive and follow my own path, I would never have picked up a camera in the first place. So, when I first started, I had no influences, I was like a blank canvas.

When I got into college, on the first day of term at the London College of Printing [now the London College of Communication], I walked in, and they were handing out magazines. I went up to ask if I could have one, looked at it, and asked the person handing it out “who had made this?” It was so sophisticated. “We did,” was the response, “and you can come and do it too.” Up until that point, I thought the people who made magazines had to be from an elite group of people. My mum and dad referred to the people who made things in the media as “they.” But from that magazine – it was called Succession – it was really apparent that “they” could be me.

Consequently, all through my time at college, I studied photography in parallel to making student magazines. My theory was that whatever happened, I would have an understanding of what commissioners wanted. In a way, that introduction to publishing put the kibosh on my art career. Up to that point, I thought I wanted to be a documentary or art photographer. But the understanding of how to make magazines, and actually get my photography into the hands of an audience, was far more seductive.