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Local photographer Davey Barber (5 Foot Photography) has set out to explore and photograph the very place that raised him, the Canberra suburbs of yesterday, today and tomorrow for his debut exhibition This Is Suburbia.

Commissioned by Craft ACT for the 2020 DESIGN Canberra festival, this photo series documents the ridiculously photogenic city of Canberra. Most photographers use suburban streets to get to their destination: on this occasion the streets are the destination. Barber draws on his own 30 years of life experience in the suburbs.

The photographer’s intention is to document what unique characteristics make the suburbs instantly recognisable to residents and to people just passing through, from the type of dwellings, shops, laneways, parks and the residents themselves. To emphasise Canberra’s ‘Bush Capital’ title, the photographs also document the four very distinct seasons of our city.