Brent Lukey is a Melbourne based commercial / art photographer who originally entered the academic arts arena by studying Anthropology and Cinema Studies at La Trobe University, then Film and Multimedia at Swinburn University.
What's interesting is that his passion for photography – another lens-based artistic practice – arose from its sheer immediacy and simplicity. Unlike film projects, photography doesn't require a cast, crew, or an elaborate production schedule. It’s just the artist, the subject, and a single frame in which to evoke a narrative. And this is what makes his personal work so compelling – they often feel like film stills, rich with implied stories and cinematic atmosphere.
Lukey is also a relentless student of imagery, constantly absorbing and analysing photographs to sharpen his visual literacy. This depth of understanding is evident in the breadth of his work, as he seamlessly moves between shooting book covers, financial reports, portraits, and more conceptual art photography projects and installations.
We catch up with him in his Southbank studio to find out what drives his image-making, how he balances the commercial with the personal, and why storytelling remains at the heart of it all.
How has your background in film influenced your still images? Why did you transition from moving pictures to stills?
I went to film school and made short films. I wanted to be a filmmaker and a storyteller. However, I found filmmaking too collaborative and expensive. Stills photography allows for more solo work or with just one other person, which appealed to my working style.
The hardest part of the transition was learning to tell a story in a single frame, rather than through editing. I don't make movies anymore, nor do I know how to.
You never considered video installations as a format? I’ve seen it successfully installed into a lift in a fancy hotel. It makes sense in that kind of setting, where you have a captive audience and only a short window of time to make an impact.
I haven’t done that format. You couldn’t put that sort of thing in a house – I’d imagine you’d go a little mad having the same thing on repeat haha.
How does a photographer's personality or characteristics shine through in their work? Is there a thread there that you can see with some of your work?
I don't mind an awkward moment. I can tell when other people feel awkward, and I do find that slightly amusing. I look at how people move and position themselves in relation to other people, I’m interested in that, and that comes through in my photography.
Do you think that a camera being present can make people feel inherently awkward – or overtly self-aware?
When shooting street photography, I try to act as if I'm invisible.
For studio portraits, it takes about half an hour to break down that self-awareness. People try to double think what I’m doing with the camera. We might spend that time trying to understand one another.
After that, we get about 20 minutes where we are 'in sync', and I call that a 'false intimacy', where you have a false intimate moment with the sitter. And that’s when the gold is made.
I agree, it’s different when you have a session with say a CEO and everything is pre-planned with your assistant sitting in for the lighting / framing set up, so the CEO can just walk into the set and leave quickly as they are generally time-poor people. Everything is quite rushed.
I think the best portraits are when you get to hang out with someone so they become bored with you, or at least become slightly oblivious towards the camera. That’s where you get more intimate 'real' portraits. They are the best images.
They are the best portraits! I do an hour and a half session with people. It’s the only way to get to what you spoke of. How do you get in ‘the zone’? The best photographers can get in the zone pretty quickly. They can find angles easily and it’s hard to do.
Do you spend time looking for people’s best angles or 'faults'.
In an answer – yes. I’m always analysing a lot of things but also where the posture, clothing, short or broad lighting, but especially the character, and where is the beauty? Have I succeeded in my eye for details?
I often ask myself what makes some photographers stand out from other photographers and sometimes I think it’s just sensitivity. They are sensitive to what they are looking at, and who they are working with, how they work with them. And they have a great rapport, and an amazing eye. I think that sends them to the top – well… sometimes…
Agreed – a lot of photography is personality-driven, where the photographer sets the tone of the shoot. For example, an extroverted photographer might create a very different atmosphere compared to an introverted one.
But does that atmosphere actually lift or make the sitter feel at ease? And what about creating a true portrait – how do you conjure a genuine representation of the person in front of the lens?
I think it is between the two of you. It depends on the client and the context. I do portraits of classical musicians and writers, and mostly I want them to look interesting and mysterious. Well – just a hint of mystery. It makes people look at the photo for longer.
That’s funny because when I’m shooting portraits of surgeons, I don’t want them to look mysterious – I want them to look friendly, trustworthy, responsible, dependable – like they won’t leave a pair of surgical scissors inside of you by mistake.
Haha. No off-beat, mysterious quirky photos thanks.
Is lifting someone’s smile using photoshop wrong?
No – it’s just following the brief!
How do you feel about the portraits in the National Portrait Prize often being so sombre?
I don't know the answer to that, but I'm fascinated by it. In the art world, something that looks more serious than happy seems to convey a more complex emotion.
Lets' get back to your practice – what’s a typical work day?
Every morning when I arrive at the studio, I spend about an hour looking at art and photography websites, seeing what's being shown. I collect images and put them into a 'super mood board' file that documents 10 years of interests, covering anything from art to photography.
It could be anything. I find that really influences how I try to improve and see the world as ‘fresh’ as possible. I don't want to be stuck. I want to get better every day, I want to take a better photo tomorrow than I did today, and I don't like to be stuck in patterns of style.
You have some photos from your Imagining / Remembering series that evoke a feeling of looking out a car window as a child, with electricity towers and trees. Is that a new direction for your work? It's not what photographers would call technically perfect – but they have a strong vibe.
Thanks for noticing that. I'm really interested in art and believe the key to being a better photographer is to have a painterly style, but without making it look like a painting. Bill Henson has a painterly style without trying to look like a painting. I look at a lot of art and think, 'How can I make photography have a painterly style but still be distinctly photography?' That's probably all I'm trying to do.
Your self-portraits are pretty hysterical. Do you see the world as a funny place, or is humour a form of therapy in your work?
I like this question a lot. I don't make 'joke photos', but I'm very optimistic and interested in the absurdities of things. I don't take things too seriously, and I think that comes through. I like the idea of a self-portrait where you can be anything.
I look at fashion photography a lot, and I think fashion photography does silly things – but makes the model do them very seriously. I try to do that in a self-portrait: do a silly thing and take it really seriously. I think you can get a lot of interesting ideas and photos out of that. So I also look for that on the street a little bit.
The flip-side of funny is probably prison. With your installation at Pentridge Prison ‘Could the Shadows Speak’ – you marry sound with images. Tell us how this exhibition came about, and what was the message you were trying to convey here?
After seeing my street photography and how I focus on darkness and shadows, the National Trust at Pentridge Prison booked me for a commercial job.
During a reconnaissance trip, I was given access to abandoned, restricted parts of the prison, which were amazing and moving – full of dark and heavy feelings.
I took photos then went back to the National Trust and suggested an exhibition, and they granted me further access to document those areas.
I spent hours alone in the creepy cells, in the dust and birdshit, on old decrepit beds trying to find what would be consistent over 100-150 years. I decided it was the walls and the passage of the sun, that connected the prisoners of the past – to the light I was seeing.
Whoever was there 100 years ago was watching the same light pass-through time like I was in that moment. This is what informed the exhibition, so it was documentary based, and then added the psychological element of ‘deep time’ over it.
The exhibition had three galleries. One was about the past and surveillance, the second about the present and the idea of fragmentation of time, and the third was a meditation on deep time, featuring a video of one doorway slowly transitioning from both sides. I didn't want to just put photographs on a wall – I wanted to create an immersive mood.
Art photography can be more than just photos on a wall.
I think the mood here could also double as a way to ‘scare people straight’. If I was a kid seeing this, I’d think that I’d never want to go to prison.
That’s right – if it was just photos on a wall – most kids wouldn’t care. Many children visited and were intrigued by the show. My kids saw it and were fascinated by it – and they usually think what I do is boring haha.
Do you sell prints of your street photography, and how do you approach the pricing side of things?
Yes, I do. Over the last five years, I've tried to understand why some photographers can sell work for a lot of money and others can't. I think the 'painterly' quality is important, and you need to present yourself more as a visual artist than just a photographer.
While I respect decorative artists who produce technically amazing work and sell it for a lot, I aim for the visual artist market and try to sell through art galleries rather than just photography galleries. I believe art is about creating a sense of the artist, and if you can do that, you can charge more.
How do you typically sell your work – through galleries or your website?
I've had work in galleries and hardly sold anything directly from those exhibitions. However, presenting that work has led to people commissioning me or buying work later.
For example, I had solo exhibitions at Flinders Lane Gallery and the City Library in Melbourne, where I didn't sell work directly, but have sold pieces connected to those exhibitions over the past year.
I also have six works in public areas of the Pitt Street building in Sydney and was commissioned to do 19 street works for a new building in South Bank. So, it's significant work that has come indirectly from exhibiting.
Your 'We don’t talk like we used’ to is a favourite series of mine. Did you come up with the text first and find the image to suit or collect the images over time. Are these your own quotes?
There are different themes that come from my work. And they don’t really relate to each other.
This in particular was from a series of streetscapes where there appeared to be a disconnection in relationships between the objects in the image. It all came to me because I was doing a corporate job for an interior designer, and they were debating whether the chairs were 'talking to each other.' I thought, ‘I can see these objects, like two chairs in a backyard, as if they're a couple.'
I can see that!
So then I started seeing other things in my work that looked like couples or relationships that have broken down and then I made up most of those quotes like they were film stills from films that don’t exist.
I'm very interested in cinema; I like cinema and subtitled cinema. I was looking for a way to make those photos look like film stills from a strange art film.
As I was saying previously about researching images – I take film grabs off websites with subtitles from movies I like, and that inspires the idea that they can be still images, not just moving images. Those still images can have their own narrative and be artworks by themselves.
Tell us about your setup at the Boyd Community Hub in South Bank.
The Boyd Community Hub is a City of Melbourne building with a library and community rooms. Upstairs, it has seven subsidised art studios that are leased to artists for short or longer periods.
I have a private studio here, which isn't huge but has high ceilings and enough space for a portrait art practice. It's also right near the city for my street practice.
This setup means I'm not leasing a studio that costs thousands, so I can be more creative and choose the clients I want to work with. It's not like a typical co-working creative hub; it's more of a quiet studio practice.
Do you work from the studio often?
I work about three days a week from here. I'll assess photos I took on the street the day before, or work on commissions and all the administrative parts of that such as framing. It provides a great space, and I believe working creatively from home is difficult.
You need a dedicated, separate space that opens your mind to ideas and possibilities that home can restrict. It’s more productive. This space has changed the way I think of photography. There are less distractions. Being here makes me feel like an artist who uses photography.
Do you have any advice to your younger photographer self?
A photographer friend of mine, Andrew Chapman, recently gave a talk. He used this example, which I love: in your first year of college, you think you've got 20 amazing photos.
In your second year, you look back and think maybe you only had one or two good photos.
By your third year, you might not think you had any good photos in your first year. He was explaining that as you go further in your career, you're always finding fewer photos that you think are great.
Do you have any particular influences or photographers you admire?
My favourite photographer is without a doubt Shin Noguchi, a Japanese street photographer. I'm also really interested in Frederick Wiseman, the documentary filmmaker, who does observational films without narrative or voice-over. This inspires my observational street photography, as I prefer to observe and watch rather than making something happen.
Valeria Mittelman, a German portrait photographer, inspires me with her low production values but ability to find something interesting and mysterious in her subjects.
Another favourite is French photographer Roberto Frankenberg, who creates really low-key but beautifully technical portraits. I also love Paolo Sorrentino films and take a lot from cinema in general.
Any advice to emerging photographers?
I have done a guest lecture at Photography Studies College on this. My primary advice is to stop watching YouTube videos about making photos and instead go out and do personal projects. Learn from your mistakes and identify which photos you think look great – and those that don't quite work, but still have a good vibe, and that's how you'll start to identify your own style.
It doesn't have to be technically perfect. I struggle with being less formal in my own style.
Finding your voice is about taking more photos, carefully considering why you like or dislike them, and learning from that. It's better than copying others.
What future work can we look forward to seeing?
My latest commission has 10 brand new works. It's all under one theme, location-specific, like a Paul Auster novel. It will go public in August; I'm at the final stage. It's going to be in all the public areas of the new building in South Bank, so people can come and look at it. There is going to be some form of opening, so I am going to promote it as an exhibition. I will invite you, and the clients want to promote it as an exhibition, so we are going to do that in some form."
