Piers Cunliffe

This project sets out to take a deeper look at some of the ordinary people who climb.

Members of the climbing community, by definition, all have a common interest in either rock climbing or mountaineering. Most are amateurs and climb for leisure. Some look for adventure and excitement, others for stress relief from their everyday jobs and others find the social element to their tastes. A very select few are fortunate to be so skilled they receive payment often in the form of sponsorship. They are the climbers we see in climbing magazines and the photography is centred upon dramatic action shots which emphasise the difficulty and flamboyance at the very top level of their sport. 

As a reader of these magazines we do not really get to know a great deal about the climbers themselves. In fact many of these sponsored climbers have quite humble backgrounds and jobs. One such example is Steve McClure, a fantastic sport climber and one of Britain’s top athletes who is an engineer and happens to climb to a very high standard.

By echoing an everyday workplace action the project exposes a climber’s profession or job to their leisure activity. The photographs are intended to provide a visual link to the person and provide us with a clue as to why they climb.