
Colin McPherson has enjoyed a thirty-five career as a photojournalist and documentary photographer covering news and features at home and abroad for leading newspapers, magazines and photo agencies. Whilst this work focuses primarily on politics and current affairs, he has developed a number of projects which are longer-term visual explorations of life in Scotland today. McPherson’s Catching the Tide series is one of the cornerstones of his photography practice. Commencing in the mid-1990s, it is an ongoing study into the decline of the traditional salmon net fishing industry in Scotland, which focuses on the environmental and social impact felt by coastal communities due to the decline of fish stocks in the country’s waters. This work has been published and exhibited internationally and is held by a number of leading archives and collections such as the Scottish Photography Archive and the University of St. Andrews. His photography has been featured in more than 30 solo and group exhibitions and his major Document Scotland projects include A Fine Line, The Fall and Rise of Ravenscraig and Treasured Island, the last of which was his contribution to the collective’s touring show titled A Contested Land which was shown at the Martin Parr Foundation, Perth Museum and Art Gallery and lastly at the Staatliche Museen, Berlin in 2022. In 2024, When Saturday Comes magazine published At The Match, a landmark photobook featuring Colin's work over the last 20 years documenting football culture in Scotland and the rest of the UK.