Stephen Shaw (born 1976, year of punk) was raised on Grangepark, Blackpool in the North West of England. He is an MA photographer at Central Lancaster University, and has a BA first class honours in photography. Shaw is frequently published and specialises in symbolism, Social Documentary and Portraiture, working within street / documentary. Shaw's images are motivated by pain and memorialism. He has great empathy with a desire to research failed human constructs having lived a darker side of life that he frequently questions and talks about with truth and a deep understanding of the people that inhabit its fabric, hoping to help them. This is his driving force to evolve knowledge through the photographic medium, bringing subjects he cares about to the attention of a wider audience.