Candid Portraits Celebrate The Everyday Life

The Hay-on-Wye based photographer’s set of unposed portraits is part of a temporary exhibition for the annual Hay Festival.

Charity’s photos, she says, are about “celebrating real people."

“I just like real people rather than posed shots. Pictures that make people laugh a bit. I just see things when I walk and am out and about.”

The group of shots includes a photo of Charity’s own daughter sat under a 60s-style hair setter, taken after an impromptu trip to the hairdressers.

Charity said: “My eight-year-old decided she desperately needed a haircut while we were on holiday in Pembrokeshire and so we randomly stumbled upon Suzanne’s hairdressing salon in Fishguard. It was such a great place, it hadn’t been updated since the sixties!

“This photo shows my daughter and another customer under the retro hairdryers.”

Taking her camera with her wherever she goes, Charity finds much of her inspiration in Hay-on-Wye – but also enjoys travelling to bigger cities.
She said: “You never know when you’re going to stumble upon a gem of a character.

“Even in a small place like Hay-on-Wye there is plenty of inspiration, but I also love going to cities where you see the most amazing people just going about their business in the street.

“I’m really interested in the way that people interact with street backgrounds in interesting ways that they aren’t aware of.”

The small collection of photos were taken over the last year.

Charity said: “I thinking putting them all together shows the colourful and wonderful characters that we are surrounded by in everyday life.”

Billie Charity's 'celebrating real people and local landscapes' is a shared exhibition with Jasper Fforde 'Ceiling fan: In praise of the overhead' at the Castle Cafe pop-up.

The cafe and exhibition run until end of Hay festival 4 June.