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Kate Carpenter

@katecarpenter.bsky.social
234 followers 156 following 174 posts

Photographs about time, place and memory, much of it rooted in the experience of caring for relatives through their years of dementia. And trees, lots of trees. Collaborations | commissions | books | prints | talks | workshops www.katecarpenter.com

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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Through photography and writing, and inspired by the musical theatre works of Stephen Sondheim, we’re telling a story about the last chapter of Caroline’s life: a story about home and family, music and memory, and the passing of people and time.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
My Mum, Eleanor’s Granny Caroline, had herself been a photographer. She developed a rare visual form of dementia, and lost, along with her memory, the ability to use a camera & even to understand a picture. She never lost her love of music, giving us a way to communicate with her, right to the end.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
‘An Ordinary Sunday’ Book and exhibition launching November 5th 2026.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
I’ve just taken a look at your page. Beautiful work!
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Thank you Shaun. That’s very kind of you.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
I’ve just seen in Photofusion’s newsletter that they’re running the workshop again this autumn. Definitely worth going along if in striking distance!
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
To everyone who has been following this story for the last few years, who has offered words of support, or written to say that the work has touched them, my heartfelt thanks. The next chapter is coming soon.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
It was so much fun!
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 20/04/2026
I’m starting a photography newsletter and I’d love it if you’d sign up. It’ll be a behind-the-scenes look at evolving projects, and news of exhibitions, books, talks, prints and the like. Exciting things happening this year - do come along for the ride! Sign-up link below mailchi.mp/a1fc4883273f...
mailchi.mp
Kate Carpenter Newsletter Signup Page
Join me behind the scenes of my photographic practice. This is where I share excerpts from evolving projects, along with news about exhibitions, books, talks and more. Sign up and come along for the...
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 19/03/2026
“As we pass / through arrangements of shadows / towards the verticals of trees / forever*” ‘An Ordinary Sunday’ - work in progress, taking shape. Missing, of course, our collaborator in photography and music, Mum/Granny *Stephen Sondheim, Sunday in the Park with George
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 16/02/2026
In case anyone here is London-based, I’d like to let you know about this talk that I’m giving about my photobook ‘Kaleidoscope’ at the Photobook Café on March 2nd. Tickets at photobookuk.org/whats-on. Do come!
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 09/11/2025
Kirlian printing at @photofusionuk.bsky.social last weekend. We applied high voltage electricity to objects on photographic paper; the corona discharge, resulting from ionisation of the air, is recorded on the paper. This is dill and rosemary from my garden. So much fun!
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 09/11/2025
Saturday afternoon diptych
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 30/09/2025
Thank you so much, Marcella. That’s very kind.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 27/09/2025
The last photograph Over the last five or so years I’ve taken a lot of photographs of (and with) my mother. During Mum’s final days, I realised I wanted one more photograph before the end. I wanted it to be simple, serene and full of light. I think she would approve this one.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 10/09/2025
Bird between the icebergs
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 30/08/2025
Ancient ice histories
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 26/08/2025
City of ice, with its ancient stories, drifting north in the current
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 23/08/2025
I went to Greenland because I wanted to see the icebergs. The experience was extraordinary. ‘Time’s relentless melt’ writ large. Remarkable, and sobering, to think that these vast structures are so powerful and yet so transitory.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 06/08/2025
Thank you!
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 06/08/2025
Thank you Deborah 😊
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 06/08/2025
Sorting out my mother’s things. She did love window light from the north. This old fella must be 75 now.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 30/07/2025
I froze a set of Polaroids in a sheet of ice, and photographed it melting in the evening sun
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 22/07/2025
Thank you Marcella, I will!
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 21/07/2025
A fragment of new work about recent experience. I’ve created a Substack blog to share snippets. Here’s the link if you’d like to subscribe. open.substack.com/pub/kvcarpen...
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 11/06/2025
Fallen
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 06/06/2025
Fallen
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 01/06/2025
Fallen
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 30/05/2025
I seem to be disproportionately sad about the falling of this old tree, dead for as long as I’ve known it, but still standing. It was a landmark, a waypoint, and felt like a dear old friend.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 20/05/2025
Blossoms on the compost heap
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 09/04/2025
Thank you, Marcella, thank you.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 07/04/2025
Thankfully, she never lost her love for music, and her favourite soundtracks saw us through together to the end.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 07/04/2025
Despite everything, she was able to remain in the home where she had lived for over thirty years, her last days spent with the big doors open to the garden that she loved, family and friends all around.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 07/04/2025
Our wonderful, funny, kind, clever, vivacious mother has died. As many of you know, dementia robbed her slowly of that vivacity, and us of her, bit by tiny bit; every little loss another twist of the knife in our hearts.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 29/03/2025
Thank you 😊
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 29/03/2025
Thank you Marcella
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 27/03/2025
Lately
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 13/03/2025
Mixing my metaphors #memoryandforgetting #familystories #neurons #rosemaryforremembrance #oaktree #dementia
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 06/03/2025
Thank you, that’s very kind!
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 06/03/2025
Work in progress
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 02/03/2025
The empty chair (that isn’t empty) From “If You’re Not Singing I’m Not Listening” - work in progress
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 01/03/2025
Brilliant working with my daughter Eleanor, who is bringing the musical theatre dimension to the photographic work. It’s an interesting crossover, and so apt for the subject matter. Marrying the form to the content! #familystories #dementia
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 01/03/2025
Further experiments from “If You’re Not Singing I’m Not Listening” We have very different sets of images that we are coming to see as ‘songs’ within a show. Ideas for threading them together are developing. The real life narrative is unfolding as we work and that makes it quite an emotional process.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 28/02/2025
Scenes from my mother’s garden
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 25/02/2025
Scenes from my mother’s garden
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 24/02/2025
A poignant story of three years in those two sentences of yours there. Thank goodness for the smile.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 24/02/2025
I don’t know who is in the empty chair but in my mother’s mind’s eye someone is there. She talks to them. She’s been talking to Dad and Aunty P too. (I prefer this to her asking where they are.) There are more - in particular, a little boy, who, she says, is much too young to be alone.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 23/02/2025
Mum used to like a bit of Georgette Heyer back in the day (though if I recall it was something of a guilty pleasure). We’ve just had to make the switch to downstairs living; the staircase is much too dangerous now. I found this lost, loose leaf under her bed when we moved it.
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 17/02/2025
Thanks Michael! Indeed, all in favour of happy accidents!
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Kate Carpenter @katecarpenter.bsky.social · 17/02/2025
When your experiment goes wrong but you go with it and it ends up expressing something you haven’t fully found words for yet. Distorted rosemary reflection + Unryu paper + encaustic + window backlight & a hand. #dementia #raredementia #family #care #memoryandforgetting #rosemaryforremembrance
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