John Bulmer

• North UK
• Manchester

• John Bulmer was a pioneer of colour photography in the early 1960’s working for the Sunday Times Magazine from the very first issue till the 1970’s.

  He was brought up in Herefordshire, in England, became a passionate photographer, and when he went to study engineering at Cambridge spent most of his time photographing.

  The writer Martin Harrison, in his book about photography in the 60’s “The Young Meteors” describes the start of the Colour Magazines in Britain:-

  “The switch to colour was, therefore, quite sudden and few photographers were prepared for it.

  John Bulmer was recognised immediately for having made the necessary adjustment and thinking specifically in terms of colour became one of the most prolific contributors of colour reportage to the Sunday Times Colour Section.

  Many of Bulmer’s most important assignments were abroad, but he was also acknowledged as an adroit recorder of provincial Britain. His reputation as a recorder of the industrial cityscape was probably gained at “Town Magazine”, where he was responsible for stories on Nelson, Lancashire, The Black Country, and The North is dead” But his work on the North of England in colour is unique. Though a number of amateurs have photographed the industrial North in colour, John is probably the only serious professional to have documented the last years of Britain’s industrial North in colour.