Archmospheres

Hello! Please introduce yourself.

My name is Marc Goodwin. I am an architectural photographer, writer, and teacher.

What sparked your interest in the photography of architecture? When, and how did this fascination with buildings start?

When I was in Goldsmiths for my photography MA, I spent my entire time looking at, shooting, and reading about architecture.

You are part of a company of architectural photographers called Archmospheres. What are the goals and aims of this company? What preconceived notions or conventions in architectural photography do you wish to challenge?

Architectural photography is beautiful and inspiring, but it can be too uniform—a universal style pervades. We aim to develop an approach that is more local, spontaneous, and varied. This is to address the issue wherein sense of place is eroded by repetitious representation.

What for you is the role of photography in the field of architecture and how does it affect the way people view and understand it?

Most buildings are seen in photographs, not first-hand. Hence, the photographic read of a building is the primary one. That puts a big responsibility on the people commissioning, shooting, and publishing architectural photographs.

How do you go about capturing both architecture and atmosphere? How would you describe a picture that is ‘archmospheric’?

I work with a medium format technical camera that is designed to do one thing: shoot architecture. I spend an enormous amount of time walking around and through buildings, watching the weather and light change, and looking for interesting things going on. Archmospheres refers to the two central aspects of our work: architecture and atmosphere.

This issue is all about keeping heritage alive. How do you think can your ‘archmospheric’ approach to photography help further the cause of architectural heritage preservation?

We care very much about the specificity of a place. I think standardized photography is part of a larger mindset that is so accustomed to mechanical, streamlined efficiency that it overlooks what is great about architecture—the sense of being in a special, beautifully thought-out place, designed by a human being with sensitivity to a site.

What is your imaging device of choice?

My kit consists of Cambo WRS 1200, Cambo WDS, Hasselblad SWC, Hasselblad CFV-50c and a range of lenses.

Can you cite a place or a building you’ve photographed which you feel had immense ‘archmospheric’ quality?

I recently shot a church designed by OOPEAA. I am not religious but when light poured in through the window, painting a diagonal strip across the wooden paneling, I could sense both how good the architect was and how fortunate I was to be there at the right place and at the right time.

Aside from the photography of architecture, do you engage in other hobbies or interests?

I love to swim the butterfly (especially in the sea), to run in the woods in the Nordics; Travel and reading are obsessions, and I regularly draw really weird characters. •