Shoot! was developed over 5 years by Wideyeds’ Louise Taylor. During this time she joined a small pheasant and partridge shooting syndicate in Tow Law, County Durham on both work and shoot days. The shooting season (for pheasant) runs from 1st October till 1st February but creates a unique year round social space as members share the cost and labour of preparing for the season. During the closed season this involves ongoing woodland management and rearing game birds for release.

Participants are extremely diverse, and are drawn from rural and urban areas, young and old, men and women, and people from a diverse range of cultural, educational and occupational backgrounds.

Whilst the final objective is to try one’s skill in actually shooting ‘sporting’ game birds, the process constructs a much larger social space for male and female sociability, for passing on traditions and sharing country lore and living practices.

An early edit of Shoot! was first shown in Newcastle as part of the BlindboysWideyed collaboration in March 2010. It was then shown in Mumbai as part of the international BlowUp Bombay 2010 street exhibition. In 2013, Shoot! was selected following an international open call for work for The Social: Encountering Photography, a new international celebration of photography, organised by North East Photography Network and was shown at Durham Art Gallery, 17th October 2013 – 12th January 2014. Selected images from Shoot! were exhibited at Carlisle Photo Festival for Visualising the Animal, 2015-2016.

Shoot! the book was published by Wideyed Editions in September 2014. Limited to 75 copies the handmade book features 29 colour photographs and 12 game recipes. More information here