Pink Floyd collaborator Polly Samson, wife and creative partner of David Gilmour, has a London photo exhibition featuring images of the creation, recording and live performance of Gilmour's Luck and Strange album.
Novelist Samson was the chief lyricist on Pink Floyd albums The Division Bell (1994) and The Endless River (2014) as well as on Gilmour’s On an Island, Rattle That Lock and 2024's Luck and Strange. During the creation of Gilmour's fifth and most recent solo album, Samson took photographs showing the progression of the creation of the album from conception to recording and from release to live performance, which were published last year in the book David Gilmour - Luck and Strange - Studio/Live. A selection of these images will feature in Samson's new exhibition, Polly Samson - Between This Breath and Then, hosted at the Leica Gallery London.
A synopsis for the show reads: "Firmly rooted in the literary world with five highly acclaimed and widely-translated works of fiction published to date, Samson has been documenting concert tours, on film and digital, for over twenty years. Her sixth book, Luck and Strange Studio/Live is a full throttle photographic ‘trip’ providing fertile and vivid ground for her inaugural show with Leica. The work offers an intimate perspective not only on the recordings and performance of an album but also on the creative process formed between two longstanding artistic partners – herself and the book’s key subject David Gilmour.
"Like her lyrics that have shaped some of contemporary music’s most resonant recordings, Samson here brings a similar sensibility to the photographic medium - there is a definite emotion that cloaks the work, deeply and sometimes darkly.
"The show begins with a portrait of the artist, David Gilmour and their dog, reflected in a large mirror, placed in a misty landscape, setting the tone for the viewers’ journey and experience which is all about atmosphere rather than spectacle. Light is king throughout her work, sometimes going to the extreme of only working with candlelight rendering intimate the brightest of recording studios. A quiet exchange of glances or familiar unspoken communication and trust is documented steadily in parallel with explosive moments of energy and the pure magic of being alive.
"Samson’s framing of image reflects her background as a writer; there is a narrative weight while remaining open, suggestive and sometimes playful – one cannot help but wonder when you look at the image ‘Muse and Magpie’ what that story is and there certainly is a very personal one. The exhibition explores questions of authorship and presence — who stands behind the lens, who occupies the frame, and how creative identity is both individual and shared.
"Through encountering this exhibition we discover a different facet of Samson’s practice, expanding her multidisciplinary oeuvre and foregrounding photography as a natural extension of her storytelling voice."
The exhibition at the Leica Gallery is open until May 7. More details here. And you can see a selection of the images alongside commentary from Samson here.
