Welcome! I’m Jack Lowe, a documentarist using photography, audio, film and words to shine a light on the greatness of others.
Over the years, I’ve worked in the photographic industry as an assistant, agent, retoucher and printmaker.
Of course, I’ve also worked as a photographer but it doesn’t feel like work — photography is a medium that’s pumping through my veins and simply a large part of who I am.
I’ve carried a camera for as long as I can remember, from the time my grandmother gave me an old Kodak Instamatic when I was 8 years old.
Today, I make photographs exactly as the Victorians used to between the 1850s and 1880s using a process known as wet collodion. Unlike many contemporary photographic processes, each plate is unique, unreproducible and irreplaceable — a true one-off.
The photographs are made directly onto glass or metal. The whole procedure is carried out using a portable dark box or, over recent years, in my decommissioned NHS ambulance called Neena.
You’ve landed on a website that I first published in 2012. It’s a place where I discuss and share topics that interest me beyond the realms of The Lifeboat Station Project, my ongoing 10 year mission to photograph all 238 RNLI lifeboat stations on glass.
After 150 stations and over 5 years working on the coast, my station visits came to an abrupt pause when the first social distancing restrictions were announced on 16th March 2020.
However, I managed to keep The Lifeboat Station Project alive and it remains my full-time occupation. Indeed, I’ve come to consider it my life’s work.
The RNLI were finally able to give me the green light to return to the coast in March 2022, so the odyssey continues!
Here’s a short film about the project by Sean Tucker:
Contact Me
I hope you enjoy perusing these pages. If you’d like to get in touch, please feel free to use the contact form.
I’ll look forward to hearing from you…
Jack Lowe
Jack Lowe 