Project Heron

A sign on a table reminding people to be socially distant
The Wellcome Sanger Institute campus
A plant in an empty office
Windowsill
Scientific equipment in a lab
Rob Amato photographed at his home
A buzzer at the Wellcome Sanger Institute surrounded by signs to ring it
A man making coffee in his kitchen
A worker called Rich working from his home office - the spare bedroom
A team portrait of those working in the stores at Wellcome Sanger campus
The front door of Rich Livett's home
A portrait of a man in his garden
Used teaspoon neatly placed on someones desk
Rich Livett's dog at his home
A plant
A spider plant on a windowsill in a stairway
A calendar in the kitchen of someone working from home
A portrait of Rich Livett's dog in his garden
Computer screens with coding on
Technicians in a high security lab working with COVID-19 samples
An england football sticker on a window
A picture of some equipment named Edwina
Mundane shot of some electical sockets
Mundane shot of an eye cleanser
A worker with steamed up glasses wearing a mask
A portrait of Ian Johnston of the Sanger Institure in his office
David Jackson in his back doorway at his home
Coats hanging on hooks in an office
Mundane items hanging on a wall in the labs
Someone working with scientific equipment in the labs
A piece of equipment covered in labels
Sample crates
Scientific equipment in contrasting windowlight
Scientific equipment
Some of the Wellcome Sanger Institure campus in sunshine
A snapshot of a dark laboratory
Some scientific equipment
Empty seating at the campus
Post it notes full of writing
Scientific equipment in COVID labs
Hazardous waste bins in a sealed off lab
Laboratory worker in high vis orange
Bags hanging full of used PPE
Spray bottles in a laboratory
Portrait of a woman on the Wellcome Campus
Portrait of a woman on the Wellcome Campus in the sun
Mundane shot of an office wall
Portrait of a woman on the Wellcome Campus wearing a mask
A worker in a laboratory
An empty canteen at the Wellcome Campus
A masked worker at the campus
Portrait of a woman on the Wellcome Campus
A see through tub in a laboratory
Women working in the laboratories
A lone worker in an office at the Wellcome campus
Mundane objects left behind in an empty office
A whiteboard with COVID on it
Scientific equipment on display
A lab worker in full PPE
A computer that has a notice on saying it is not available to work on
Empty skates for transporting samples
A thermometer registering temperatures on freezers containing Coronavirus samples
Mundane equipment
People walking through a freezer door
Signage on a wall
Portrait of a worker on the Wellcome Campus
Mundane snapshot of some exterior items on campus
A wide shot of laboratories
A computer used for scanning samples of COVID-19
Pallets of salt
Crates of samples in the back of a van
A van delivering samples to walk in freezers
A mundane shot of some of the campus at Wellcome
A worker at walk in freezers
A sign advising a max occupancy of 2
A portrait of a data centre worker at Wellcome Sanger
Cabling at a data centre
Messy cabling in the data centre
Pipe work outside a shed
A scientific operations worker at walk in freezers
Crates of samples
A worker wearing a mask in the sunshine
A screened off till in an empty canteen

THUMBNAILS

About Project Heron

This photo essay shot in September 2020 aims to document all those involved in the sequencing of COVID-19 at the Wellcome Sanger Institute, from software development trying to handle the immense volume of information, to those actually in the labs themselves.

Photographed on campus and at home, I want to create a portrait of the environments ordinary people are working in to better understand the epidemic that has hit the world in 2020.

From scientific equipment down to a teaspoon I want these images to show the normality in something that is so immense, many of us find it hard to comprehend.
Maybe with mundane detail mixed in, it helps us remember that pandemics and illness are part of everyday nature that we need to understand in order to live with.

Thanks to the Sanger Institute for inviting me in to document such an historic point in history.