Tagged: travel
On witnessing and representation
Last week, I read an article by photographer Markéta Luskačová about photographing London’s east end markets over the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. I was struck by a quotation at the end of her article by her fellow photographer Roger Mayne:
“The intention in mind must be to make a record and then an accident of having made the right record at the right time may produce ART”
I thought about this quotation when I considered my photography in the past. Without exception, it’s a representation of my life and surroundings, friends, family, work colleagues; a disorganised recording, in which I have found very little to describe as “art”. Sometimes, I’ve referred back to the odd image to show the passage of time, but I’ve found, much like my TikTok running videos, that I’ve often shot away from where change occurs.
Recently I have been more deliberate in my photography. I’ve been trying to shoot slower exposures to get deeper focus, even with a little motion blurring. Indeed, I’ve been (self) consciously trying to make “artistic” images; something beautiful out of my surroundings. But Mayne’s quotation made me reconsider this: what about recording the world around me as straightforwardly as possible?
I often think of Don McCullin advising nascent conflict photographers to shoot their surroundings rather than aim for far-off conflict zones.
“Young people often write me letters and ring me up, saying they want to do this or that, and the thing that most annoys me is when they say they want to be a war photographer. I say, OK, if you want to be a war photographer, go to the inner cities in England. You don’t have to get on a plane to the Middle East or wherever. There are social wars in our cities: homeless people, poor people, people begging outside of banks. You will find the most incredible poverty and that is a war as big as any other.”
I wonder if such observation would have seen Brexit coming, and how it would currently show the current flag-hanging in various neighbourhoods. I wonder if, like Ms. Luskačová, I should just wander up and down my neighbourhood with my camera and record anything that interests me.
The songwriter, performer and activist Nina Simone said that as an artist:
“I CHOOSE to reflect the times and situations in which I find myself. That, to me, is my duty.”
In this world, this city, these streets, there’s a lot to reflect on. Back to work.
Technique: SXSW 2014
I use Photoshop often. I use roughly the same tools on every image: levels and curves; but while I can be quite conservative in my use, I have been both learning to use other tools in the Photoshop toolbox and experimenting with my usual techniques.
Editing some old performance images from the South by South-West festival at Austin, Texas in 2014 showed what I’ve learned and how far I need to learn, especially with editing dark images.
The red hues burnt into orange with this shot of East Cameron Folkcore performing at ATX Music.
Arthur Beatrice at Haven had some highlights burning out.
Burnouts continued with my shots of The Preatures that same night: this is one of the less distorted images.
I have the most regrets with Banks: my record of her stunning performance is filled with these pushed and distorted colours.
I had more luck with the highlights at Pure Bathing Culture‘s performance at the Paste Party in Swan Dive.
Although quite a distance away, the impeccably-styled Ski Lodge came across well at the same event.
One image from the Planete Quebec showcase [can anyone help with the band name?] was very much the type of image I wanted to be making.
My shots of Ume at Brazos Hall had a mixture of post-edit distortion and more muted colour.
I loved the look of the singer in White Sea that same night, but I’m gutted about those hot spots on her beautiful dress.
This was more like it! Deborah Harry stood out with Blondie later that evening.
With all these colour blotches and the like, I started experimenting on levels with my London Grammar shots from Hype Hotel. A little tweak with a slider brought out the faces, grain and light beams with a lovely glow.
I loved the light show for No Joy, which had as much distortion as their music. This was the least obscured shot I got of their enigmatic performance.
Like many digital tools, Photoshop is an endless source of versatility. Maybe too much: after all, how many tools can one use? Still, the deeper and wider my editing experience gets, the more adventure I’ll have in making images.
I remember Paris
I hardly remember my first trip to Paris; a journey of rail and sea. I was eight years old. The London terminus (Charing Cross? Victoria?) was huge, dark and crowded, the ferry crossing uneventful and the train journey from Calais to Paris felt endless.
We stayed at the friend of a friends in St. Cloud, but I may have been misinformed as to the exact location; I just remember a nice flat in a quiet neighbourhood. Still, it was my first trip to Paris. I took one photo on a camera borrowed from my brother, which completely missed my family and concentrated on passers-by and traffic. I wish I still had it.
My next journey was as an inter-railer in my late teens. We crossed Paris numerous times and I’m happy to still have images taken with a fairly substandard 35mm SLR, along with more negatives. Somehow, with the excitement of travelling with friends, I didn’t really take everything in.
My next journeys some years later were when I really started to take notice: my Transport for London job gave me a Eurostar discount that I used heavily. A first solo trip; overnight stays with friends; a journey with a friend to celebrate her getting her MA; and romantic journeys with loved ones. All photographed with a better 35mm SLR, my first mirrorless camera and my second, cherished digital camera, in colour and black and white.
Parisian street art
Photographed: shops; statues; streets; people; parks; cemeteries; architecture; galleries. I will return and photograph more, but for now, I’m going through the photographs I’ve taken and putting them on my website.
The Paris photos start here.
Building maps
I love the London Underground. I love LEGO. So I was rather pleased to see that some enterprising people had combined the two to make five LEGO Underground maps to celebrate the 150 year anniversary of the tube system. The maps will be displayed for a few months before they’re moved to the London Transport museum.
They represented maps from 1927, Harry Beck’s original Underground diagram from 1933, 1968, the present day and a view to the future in 2020. I went about seeing them all.
The 1927 map was at South Kensington station.
Mr. Beck’s map was at Piccadilly Circus: check out the old station names and the forthcoming extension!
The 1968 map was placed on display at Green Park station.
While Stratford station had the map from the present day.
Finally, King’s Cross St. Pancras station had the future map, with Crossrail and the Northern Line extension previewed.
Whenever I saw one, a small crowd would gather, take photos or just marvel at the time it took to produce such a map. Each map was made up of more than 1000 bricks and took four days to build. They were solo efforts, by Duncan Titmarsh, the UK’s only certified LEGO professional. Well done, sir…
In the clouds
This is an artwork called Cloud: Metéoros, by husband and wife team Lucy and Jorge Orta. It’s comprised of two cloud-like structures, suspended from the roof of St. Pancras International station by wires. When I read about this sculpture I knew that I had to visit and photograph it before too long.
Facing the end of the Eurostar platforms, the cloud forms are laden with what seem like travellers who have been on a similar train journey.
The awfully nice staff at the Searcy’s champagne bar let me shoot from a decent angle in their establishment, but I could never get the angle I wanted: straight on. For this, I think I would need to be on the Eurostar platforms themselves. And to do that? Maybe there’s another trip to Paris, Brussels or Lille on the cards…
Burning Details 
You must be logged in to post a comment.