Screen Time

• Dafydd Jones is recognized as one of the world's leading social photographers, which over the years has given him unique access to an extraordinary range of social events - from exclusive parties, to the races, to fashion shows, film festivals and debutantes balls
• His keen eye, and an instinct for the absurd, has allowed him to capture the behaviour of people who are either unaware of or indifferent to the camera
• Screen Time explores a variety of social situations, from the mundane to the exalted, and features celebrities, actors, models and even the occasional princess - all glued to their phones

Almost everyone uses a smartphone, and most of us are addicted. In this book, photographer Dafydd Jones shows us just how pervasive our screen addiction has become. In almost every social situation, he shows how the smartphone has killed conversation and changed the way we look at the world.

'In the eighties and nineties', says Jones, 'when I photographed young people at parties or balls, I'd find them chatting each other up, or smooching in corners. Now I see them sneaking looks on their iPhones, checking on their Instagram feeds, or whatever it is they're hooked on. They hardly talk to each other, or make eye contact at all. And it's not just a generational thing - it afflicts the oldies too. Who knows what impact it's having in the bedroom. It's probably a race to see what will wipe out humanity first - global climate change or screen-induced sexual indifference.'

Dafydd Jones (b. 1956) is one of the world's leading social photographers. He decided to become a photographer while studying fine art at university. In 1981 he entered a set of pictures of 'Bright Young Things' in a photography competition run by the Sunday Times Magazine, and was awarded a prize. As a result, he was hired by Tina Brown to photograph balls, debutante dances and weddings for the Tatler. He moved to New York in 1989 - a move helped by generous editors. While there, he worked for the New York Observer, producing feature and news-related pictures, and covered celebrity and society events for Vanity Fair. For his own enjoyment, he also took all the pictures for one issue about New York for Paper magazine. He came back to England in 1996, having watched London becoming 'the center of the cultural world and the place I wanted to be'. Since returning to London he has had slots in most of the broadsheet newspapers, including the Independent, the Times, and the Sunday Telegraph. His work is held in the collections of: the National Portrait Gallery, London; the Hyman Collection of British Photography, London; the Martin Parr Foundation, Bristol; the Opsis Foundation, New York; and the Yale Museum of British Art. An exhibition of his work from the 1980s, 'Dafydd Jones: The Last Hurrah', was held at The Photographers' Gallery, London, from August to September 2018.