About
Caroline Collett is a Yorkshire-born writer and photographer, currently living in the South West of England.
Her published writing includes an essay on personal style for ‘Pieced Work’; a critique of digitech’s exclusive nature for ‘A Museum for Now’; a white paper / presentation co-written with two UK Professors for the ‘10th Punk Scholars Network Conference’; and ‘Christine in the Court of Public Opinion’, an art piece examining perceptions of Christine Keeler in the modern day, performed live by three poets at the De Montfort University symposium ‘Reframing the Profumo Affair via Art and Artefact’ in Leicester and published on the official Christine Keeler website. Personal profiles and Q&As have also featured in The Marshwood Vale Magazine and on The Common Breath literary website.
Caroline’s particular areas of interest include memoir-writing, music of the ‘70s and ‘80s, art and feminism. She is currently working on two books – a punk rock diary / memoir and a novel about art, love and gender.
Her photographs have been published in The Observer, The Sunday Times, The Guardian, The Independent, F-Stop and Evolver Magazines. She has been shortlisted four times for The Evolver Prize, Highly Commended at The Marshwood Vale Art Awards and has received a Special Commendation at the Annual All Women Art Exhibition at Light, Space & Time Gallery. Her images have been exhibited in Minneapolis, Texas, London, Bristol and across the South-West, with two photographs used as book covers in the UK and India.
In her photography, Caroline is looking for the abstract in the real, for hidden geometries, for the play of light and for the melancholy feel of places once people have left the scene.
Bio
Caroline was born in Bradford and grew up in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, before living in London for a year aged 18. She won a scholarship to Wadham College, Oxford to study Modern Languages and lived in Paris as part of her degree, teaching English - and also enjoying the French capital’s post-punk nightlife scene of the early-mid 80s, from the bars of the Marais and regular haunt Le Piano Vache to concert venues and nightclubs such as Le Temple, La Sébale, Gibus and Les Bains Douches.
She joined the press office of MTV Europe in 1987, working on the channel’s launch party at the Roxy Club in Amsterdam before moving into the production team to write MTV’s hourly music news. She also booked and researched guests – including Eartha Kitt, Dennis Brown, Maxi Priest and Bunny Wailer – for The Steve Blame Show, presented by Steve Blame with Leigh Bowery.
MTV Europe / Motormouth on ITV / The Rough Guide to Careers
Caroline’s onscreen career began as a reporter on the second series of Janet Street-Porter/Channel 4’s groundbreaking weekend show Network 7, before she joined Saturday morning kids’ TV show ‘Motormouth’ on ITV. She then presented a film show from The Cannes Film Festival for Super Channel, interviewing stars such as John Hurt and Donald Sutherland and directors including Hugh Hudson and Emir Kusturica. Next, she co-presented the first series of ‘The Rough Guide to Careers’, commissioned by Janet Street-Porter for BBC2.
In 1990, Caroline moved behind the camera to become a producer / director for The Movie Show on BSB: a daily film show for which she produced, directed and presented segments from the Cannes, London, Edinburgh, Berlin and Deauville Film Festivals, interviewing actors such as Lauren Bacall, Anthony Hopkins, Martin Sheen, Timothy Dalton, Laurence Fishbourne, Nick Cage, Iggy Pop, Roberto Benigni and Lou Diamond Philips, plus directors Jane Campion, Louis Malle, John Waters, Richard Attenborough, Ken Loach, Jim Jarmusch and Sidney Lumet.
Special event management followed, including selling out a London West End charity premiere for Richard Attenborough’s ‘Chaplin’ to raise funds for Glenys Kinnock’s ‘One World Action’ charity, heading up celebrity recruitment for the Breakthrough Breast Cancer ‘Trading Places’ fundraiser and helping organise the ‘Save the Face’ party, when the magazine sought to raise funds after being sued by Jason Donovan in 1992.
Since the late 90s, Caroline has run her own communications company, acting as a media strategist, copywriter and publicist for leading architecture practices and interior, product and graphic designers.
She also works with artists and photographers, translating visual intent and output into words for books, newsletters, exhibitions and award submissions, including the Taylor Wessing Portrait Prize.