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Colin N. Purvor

Colin N. Purvor had a strong leaning towards the arts from very early in life, rapidly progressing from crayons to oil paintings. But when a camera was put in his hand, the magic really began.

Gaining work experience in the darkrooms of a London studio, he was soon shooting products in the studio. The discipline was now set.

The 1960’s was his canvas, a time of protests, drugs, sex, violence, mods and rockers. These are distant memories now, but snippets of the excitement and grit of this era were captured on celluloid film and despite much it being destroyed by a flood in his studio, some pearls were salvaged.

As the music scene and print evolved, Colin became the photographer for Beatwave, the magazine of pirate radio station Radio Caroline. His evenings were spent at the Ally Pally, the Scene, Ronnie Scots, the Marquee, Flamingo and Bag of Nails where his lack of recognition of security cordons and false air of being the official photographer served him well, getting him up front and personal with many artists who later became legends including the Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, Jimi Hendrix, The Who, Eric Burdon, The Move, Eric Clapton, Elkie Brooks and more.

Colin now lives in the Philippines, he’s the tall white man picking his way through the crowd with a digital SLR slung on his shoulders, content not to be lugging around 30Kg of gear as before. He maintains that analogue photography is still his preference and feels that ‘not knowing for sure’ until a film was processed encouraged excitement in a shoot. On occasion Colin can be found in expat bars where tales are aplenty but little truth is spoken, or sipping a cold San Miguel while on a shoot at one of the stunning beach resorts.