Created last year, Ken Griffiths’ series of photographic portraits capturing people and places celebrates individuals who continue to make remarkable contributions to their communities. The collection, running at Ffotogallery 3 – 24 August, Cardiff, is also a meditation on what it means to be Welsh. Emerging from the images comes a single yet multi-faceted identity from the residents of the different regions that make up Wales: the mountains in the North, the valleys of the South, the fishing communities of the West and the agricultural East. Consequently Quiet Heroes documents community life, recording a way of life that may soon become history.

Griffiths holds a significant international reputation as a photographer and within his portraits sits the skill that allows his images to directly communicate with the viewer. The sitters’ exude dignity and pride and a sense of individual character. His previous projects have included extended photo essays on the Texas panhandle, the Abruzzo region in Italy, the Smithfield meat market, Lincoln’s Inn homeless, the controversial three gorges dam project on the Yangtze and most recently the Welsh experience in Patagonia.

Ken Griffiths: Quiet Heroes, 3-24 August, Ffotogallery, Turner House, Plymouth Rd, Penarth, CF64 3DH.

Credits
1. Llangrannog, Filter 1 HighRes, image courtesy of Ken Griffiths and Ffotogallery.