MySide
Call for submissions
What’s your story? Show us your side of life.
We’re inviting you to share your life and community through documentary photography as part of MySide, our new grassroots curatorial project. Every three months we’ll set a new theme, and right now we're looking for responses to the prompt “Places That Made Us”.
This theme is all about you and your environment - the landscapes, neighbourhoods, buildings or natural spaces that have helped to form who you are and explain where you’re from.
Places That Made Us: What to photograph?
Consider photographing environments, with or without people, that feel personal or significant, including:
Landmarks and Landscapes - these could be where you grew up, where you live now, places of work or of leisure.
Everyday Places - those streets, parks, shops, factories, clubs and community centres that make up your day-to-day life.
Transformed Sites - for example: old ruins, regenerating neighbourhoods, and places of change.
Spaces of Culture and Memory - think local festivals, places of tradition, locations of community gatherings.
Personal Connections to Place - special places that carry emotional weight and narrative for you.
You don’t need to be a professional photographer, what matters is that the images feel real and personal.
Frequently Asked Questions
MySide is a public source documentary photography initiative created by the AmberSide Trust and Side, designed to capture the persona, everyday experiences of our community. It is an open call project inviting the public to document their world through photography to create a living archive of identity, culture, and social change.
This initiative is part of Side’s commitment to community storytelling, making photography more accessible and ensuring that real voices and experiences are represented. Through MySide you contribute to a collective portrait, reflecting themes of identity, resilience, heritage, and our social reality.
Every three months we’ll announce a new theme for participants to explore. You can submit your images via instagram (by using #MySide and tagging @amber_sidegallery) or directly using our: online upload form
All submissions will go to the Side team and we’ll review them against the below criteria:
Photos taken in the five years to keep things fresh and relevant to life today.
Strong images with good composition that stand out.
Photos that have feeling, spark emotion, create a connection or tell a meaningful story.
Images that capture powerful moments, people and places with a strong sense of narrative.
Creative approaches that bring a fresh perspective or highlight unexpected details.
A clear point of view that gives your image purpose and impact.
Authentic photos that feel real and true to lived experience.
Selected images will be showcased on our social media and website, for example as image highlights, as part of online exhibitions, and/or blog posts. Your images will always be credited to you.
Beyond the digital, when Side reopens or we host pop-up events we may select certain MySide images for exhibition display. Similarly the most impactful images may be curated into zines or books, creating a physical record of the project. Your images will always be credited to you.
Uploads cannot exceed 1mb, so your submission should be a lower res version of your image. If we are going to use your image in any of our projects we will be in contact to let you know and to request high res versions of your files.
Anyone! MySide is open to all, whether you take pictures on your phone or you’re an experienced photographer. This project is all about authenticity, not technical skill. By sharing your photographs you’re helping to tell a real story of life today - one image at a time.
Useful Links
