Fashion And Documentary Fuse In The Photographic Oeuvre Of Hill & Aubrey

London-based duo Tim Hill and James Aubrey Finnigan first met while assisting photographers on shoots. Today, they work together under the moniker Hill & Aubrey, creating work that humorously navigates the territory where fashion, documentary and editorial photography meet.

The collective work of Hill and Finnigan seems aesthetically bound to the United Kingdom; its grey mundanity a backdrop far more interesting to the pair than any glossy or aspirational setting. Their unique fusion of documentary with more commercial styles of photography allows them to cast a critical eye over the fashion world: They are appear uninterested in current trends, preferring to instead photograph the unique and personal. In “It’s great to be in a position to celebrate people and things that traditionally wouldn’t be associated with fashion.” an interview with Joseph, Hill remarked: “The aspirational world in which fashion is traditionally seen, on ‘beautiful’ people in incredible places, didn’t seem to have any relevance to us”. By treating fashion photography as an anthropological study, the pair draw their work back to the human. Of this, Finnigan commented, “We’re really influenced by our own lives, families and relationships… It’s great to be in a position to celebrate people and things that traditionally wouldn’t be associated with fashion.” This is perhaps why Hill & Aubrey’s work feels so intimate, so fantastical, and so very British.