The Party People: Figures on the Dancefloor photography exhibit at the Roundhouse, north London, is a quiet redecoration of its café-bar area. Individually, the photos are dynamic and often euphoric; taken as a whole, they are a celebration of the power of dance, music and community people have drawn and continue to draw from London’s nightlife.
The exhibition frames clubbing in the context of a post-pandemic world where licensing and cost barriers have irreparably altered the culture of going “out-out”. Photographers act as cultural archivists, and Party People foregrounds these dance floors as defining sites of culture in formation.
Venues and events featured include Rivoli Ballroom (hosting Deptford Northern Soul), London Trans+ Pride, Troubadour, The Camden Eye, Inferno, Club Are, Jumbi Peckham, DAYTIMERS at Phonox, Notting Hill Carnival, Sherry’s Soul Society. There’s something for everyone. The images curated are powerful depictions of a diverse range of life and culture in motion.
The final days to catch the exhibit are Friday and Saturday this week (Feb 5 and Feb 6, 2026).
James Streiker’s black and whites open up the six walls of photos. His crowd is an alternative one: first, a regal portrait of a party-goer wearing a full ballgown which, according to the description, was crafted from a single sheet of foil (you don’t gotta be rich!).
Just as striking is his Goth Couple. A man in head-to-toe black leather, decked out with spikes and studs, face covered by a gimp mask with horns, googly eyes and a zip mouth. A capital V of chest hair is the only skin on display. A woman, shorter, holds his hand. While his eyes gently meet the camera from behind his mask, hers are focused, laser-like, ahead. She wears a tall headpiece made of hair and rope and looks something like Tilda Swinton’s White Witch. There’s a nod to her partner’s outfit in the studs of her choker.
Whereas Streiker’s monochromes are up-close portraits of individual ravers, London photographer Yushy’s capture the wider landscape of partying. Carnival pictures an intergenerational, sunny side of dance culture. Trees line the background while in the fore, an older man’s eyes sparkle with laughter, his teeth exposed in a kind beam. His cap spells out “JAMAICA”. Behind him, two younger men, topless, shirts slung round their necks, one’s hand on the other’s shoulder as if to say, “I’m still here”. Rows and rows of people beyond them, all facing forwards, to where there must be a stage with music.
Yushy’s first project, Rave To The Grave, also features. Black and yellow tape cordons off the main area of a grand, empty Victorian-style hall. There are chandeliers, enormous marble pillars and a few empty bottles in the offshooting corridor where the photographer stands. Cleaning has started but not finished. Centrally, curled up against the wall on the viewer’s side of the hazard tape, two young ravers hold onto each other for dear life.
Other highlights include India Bharadwaj’s The Kiss, shot during the DAYTIMERS residency with Phonox in 2023. The Kiss is dark, barely registering on my phone’s camera save for a bright red strobe beam which cuts diagonally across the frame.
“I shot every night without flash, using only the strobes in the club to illuminate the stories on the dance floor,” says Bharadwaj in the image description. You can see the kiss more because you can see what’s around it – what’s left is the negative image of something dark, private and intimate in the centre of the club.
Finally, expressing the essence of club euphoria is Abdi Alasow’s That Feeling. “I want to be remembered as someone who took photos of Black people in the best light possible, told stories of our community in a way that was soft and romantic, pushed a central message of joy and always as a photographer who helped others and gave back as much as he could,” Alasow is quoted beneath the photo.
The lighting, as promised, is perfect. Everything pops: a red-lit woman with her eyes closed in ecstasy, fingers splayed, one palm in the centre of her chest and the other holding herself from underneath. Her hands slide towards each other in an unmistakably sensual self-embrace, her lips open and slightly pursed, her eyebrows slanted inwards and upwards in disbelief. This is the height of sensation.
The exhibit features photography by:
Abdi Alasow @filmabdi
Cleo Stoutzker @cleo_sttzkr
Dani d’Ingeo @remainsofd
Drew Hogg @999999999boyscrysendpics
Félice Knol @feliceknol
Funmi Lijadu @artbyfunmi
Ian Piczenik @ianpiz
Imogens.jpgs @imogens.jpgs
India Bharadwaj @indiabharadwaj
James Streiker @stiff_material
Jeanie Jean @jeaniejeanphotos
Justina Stasiunaite @justdesignfilms
Lucy Brewer @lucy___photo
Maddy Moore @madz.snapz
Olly Bromidge @ollybromidge
Paulie – 37 Chambers @37chambersonline
Yushy @_yushy