Due to some of the most divisive family immigration policies in the world, thousands of British families are forcibly separated by the Home Office. As a result, they must communicate with each other via ‘modern means of communication’, leading to the rise of what are now being referred to as ‘Skype Families’.

C-R92/BY seeks to investigate how one maintains a relationship with a family member who has been physically and geographically removed from one’s life and is reduced to a two-dimensional image; what does it mean to take the irrefutably unique and transfer it into the infinitely replicable?

With the possibility of the artist’s own wife facing deportation, Fordham weaves together a personal reflection of his own experience with those of other families, using images, documents, testimonies and more to explore the hardships of detention, and the fight for family life.

Samuel Fordham (Bristol, 1987) is a multidisciplinary artist working with photography, text, video and sound. A graduate of the MA Photography programme at UWE Bristol, Samuel has developed a research-based practice focused on telling intimate and often hidden stories highlighting issues surrounding childhood, family welfare and equality.

In 2018 he enrolled on a one-year mentorship through ISSP Latvia with Gordon MacDonald and Clare Strand (MacDonaldStrand), where he continued to develop his latest work C-R92BY.

Fordham’s projects are produced across platforms as installations, books and films.