Capturing the Magic: Before & After portraits of Glastonbury revellers

The series, entitled The Vale of Avalon, includes portraits of people both before and after the festival in order to discover, whether the magic of Glastonbury he felt when he first attended as a sixteen year old, could be viewed in the faces and body language of his subjects.

I know a little something about this magic, having been five times since 1995. Although it's changed so much since the mid-nineties – and yes, I'm one of those who believes it'll never be the same as the 'good old days' – there's still no other festival like it on earth.

Tom has spent the past two years, camping out at Glastonbury to take portraits of attendees, using a medium format Mamiya RZ 67, which is normally considered a studio camera, in order to gather a lot of detail from each picture. This coupled with a fill-in flash on Fuji Film gives the images their enhanced colour.

The large photographic prints will be hung on the festival perimeter fencing and Tom will be there all weekend shooting more portraits to add to the project for the final time. So if you’re heading into the festival in the next few days, stop and say hello and become part of his exhibition.

Via direct submission | All images courtesy of Tom Groves