Jillian lochner is a South African photographer now based in London. She completed her training at Nelson Mandela Metropole University in 1990. She worked commercially for many years in Cape Town for brands such as Levi’s, Adidas etc winning numerous awards including a Golden Lion award at Cannes for a Durex campaign in 2006 and was featured in Lürzer’s Archive 200 best photographers worldwide in advertising a few years running. On moving to London in 2005 she shot one of the iconic bottles for Absolut in New York as well as working on other assignments around the world.
Although she loved the campaign work she also used much of her income to produce personal work and mounted exhibitions almost annually for a period of years in Cape Town, London and Paris
The exhibition work was often controversial and showed Jillian’s darker side born out of early childhood trauma. Combined with the stress of many years of manic work and traveling eventually took its toll and soon after arriving in London the inevitable breakdown happened. Luckily she met and worked with some top professionals in the field and after 7 years of intensive recovery would now describe herself as fully recovered. Her beneficial experience of Gestalt therapy led her to study and become a therapist herself. She is now qualified and sees her own clients.
She has also recently renewed her passion for photography, starting a partnership with her husband, Andrew Carmichael, now working as LochnerCarmichael. They specialise in still life shots of luxury brands and have been commissioned by a number of magazines, brands, as well as taking part in exhibitions in London. Although still life can seem a prosaic practise the new work has a typical Lochner twist highlighting the sometimes dark and kinky side of luxury as well as its beauty.
