I am often asked about what photography means to me and therefore to ensure consistency and accuracy in my response I have reduced my thoughts to a simple statement. Photography is memory made history. It is not meant in a glib or self- satisfied way, merely as a concise answer to the question. But what does it mean?

Well, I think we can see this from two perspectives. The personal and the universal. The latter is easy to understand as we recognize local, national and international events as historical. We study them at school, listen to talks and podcasts, read books and watch history relived in films. In this sense our understanding of the visual and written artefact to document history is so evolved that we take it for granted.

The personal is more complicated. That is our responsibility; we cannot rely on historians and researchers to compile our personal histories. These are not written, discussed or filmed, unless we are famous or notorious! Therefore, the notated photograph is all we have.

I was recently talking to my father, who is 89 years of age, about wills. About what you leave behind and who gets what. That may seem to be a macbre conversation, but it is an essential one if you want to ensure that the will of the person who leaves us is implemented. I am particularly sensitive to this as I have seen so many pass, only for the will to have more holes in it than a chunk of Swiss cheese. Money, property and savings are invariably considered, but it is in the personal affects that I believe true meaning lies. Emotional connections and memories.

The photograph exists as both of these and as a factual document of lives lived. They are visual proof for future generations that present insight into where they have come from. Where their ancestors were and lived, what they wore, how they acted, what they achieved and their physicality. And yet they are so often forgotten when possessions are listed.

In a recent conversation with my mother-in-law I raised this issue. She is currently organizing a will for her 95 year old mother. An owner of photographs that record her family’s history back to the 1900s. I asked if any consideration had been made concerning these and she said no! She understood their importance, but had never thought of them as needing to be placed with a family member that would respect and protect them. She is now ensuring that a family discussion takes place to see who wants to take on this responsibility.

I will be inheriting my father’s archive of family photographs, all twenty-five albums, plus those prints that never made the albums. This makes sense if you consider what my job is, however, most families do not have someone who is professionaly engaged with the photographic medium. This can be a problem, but my suggestion is to think creatively if this is the case. Rather than look towards the obvious inheritors of immediate family members, why not consider those that may not be so close, who may be more appropriate. This is easier in an extended family, but family friends can also be considered. As photographers all we have that directly evidences the life that we have led is our photographs. Our cameras do not, and neither do our camera bags, tripods, lighting etc etc. They are also all that our families have. Therefore, we need to take that responsibility and put our photographs front and centre of our wills, to ensure they are not assigned to a bin, damp attic or garage. You know what to do next…

Dr.Grant Scott
After fifteen years art directing photography books and magazines such as Elle and Tatler, Scott began to work as a photographer for a number of advertising and editorial clients in 2000. Alongside his photographic career Scott has art directed numerous advertising campaigns, worked as a creative director at Sotheby’s, art directed foto8 magazine, founded his own photographic gallery, edited Professional Photographer magazine and launched his own title for photographers and filmmakers Hungry Eye. He founded the United Nations of Photography in 2012, and is now a Senior Lecturer and Subject Co-ordinator: Photography at Oxford Brookes University, Oxford, and a BBC Radio contributor. Scott is the author of Professional Photography: The New Global Landscape Explained (Routledge 2014), The Essential Student Guide to Professional Photography (Routledge 2015), New Ways of Seeing: The Democratic Language of Photography (Routledge 2019), What Does Photography Mean To You? (Bluecoat Press 2020) and Inside Vogue House: One building, seven magazines, sixty years of stories, (Orphans Publishing 2024). His photography has been published in At Home With The Makers of Style (Thames & Hudson 2006) and Crash Happy: A Night at The Bangers (Cafe Royal Books 2012). His film Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay was premiered in 2018.

© Grant Scott 2026