Photos by Phoenix

The Travels and Travails of February

What I remember most about February was the cold. There was a lot of travelling to be done that month and I wanted to be as easy on myself as I could be, so I took the train and retraced a wonderful trip I made on my 25th birthday. First stop was Cannes for Midem, the big European gathering of the music industry.

To say it was bitter is an understatement. It just ate through me in the way that it’s not supposed to once the temperature drops below a certain level. But it was all worth it, and I’m now thinking about how better I can plan my visit this year. See you there guys!

From there I wanted to busk a night train to Venice – the retraced tracks part of the journey. I felt rough as a badger’s arse but the booking went like a charm, even with my schoolboy French, and all that remained was to wait a few more hours in the freezing cold for the train.

And then wonderful sleep; then wonderful Venice.

It’s hard not to literally point and shoot in Venice. Try an experiment – close your eyes, point the camera in a random direction and press the button – hey presto! Art. Try it on the bridge; try it in the market; try it over coffee.

One of the breakthroughs seldom mentioned about digital photography is the huge humanitarian and ecological relief to the slaves and natural resources of the forests and silver mines formerly required to photograph and print the same views of Venice (and other offenders) for the last century. How many pictures like this do we need?

Much better to set the silver slaves to work for pictures of the return journey, for the kind of shots that just don’t work with digital.

Digital, for me at least, is about what I can see. What’s there. Film will always be about what I feel. I’m fairly sure this was shot with the same compact camera I used all those years ago on my first train trips in this part of the world, so it’s not about posh optics. Just film. And how I felt.

While the 21st century zooms in to auto skin-smoothing plug-ins for Photoshop, botox and implants de rigeur, and now HDR imaging in digital I find myself drawn to 20th century backwater discussions of which lenses produce the nicest bokeh (the out of focus bit of the image) and mechanical cameras that still keep clicking when the temperature drops and tugs battery voltage with it.

Cannes was freezing. Venice was truly, excruciatingly freezing. Prague was… ok, actually! Nice to be back, in fact. But having seen clearly in Venice that the beautiful surprises are in the details I went looking closer in my home town.

Everyone knows how beautiful the architecture is in Prague. But sometimes the whole can overshadow the details that make it. And those details may not have been planned by the architect.

It’s also about the people and the mobile architecture, too. It all adds up to the feel of the town. Besides, the other thing Prague is famous for is the beauty of the Czech women; I’ve been guilty of the sin of omission so far on this blog, so let’s put that right now.

Only a few months ago, but it feels like I’ve missed a year or even two out somewhere. Maybe I should check March and April out and make sure.

is it really a year? it seems like three...

An annual review. Why not? I used to dread it when I had a 9 to 5; seemed like higher management’s snatched opportunity for a free hit. But now it seems like a really nice way of catching my breath before plunging into 2008! Where to start? Should I hire a narrator from January to walk me through?

“Well, let me tell you: it wasn’t easy stealing Heff’s dressing gown. Damage was sustained.”

No, maybe I’ll just meander through it myself… besides, I’m sure Paul pops up again later somewhere!

So, January. I started the year flat on my back after my fall. Not much getting out and about. A bit of a quiet month, in most respects. Just a little stretch of legs along the cliffs in Tintagel, taking it easy, breathing the wonderful Cornish winter air and taking great care with my footing!

There were breaks from the quiet though. The very beginning of the year was spent with some good friends of mine in the heart of the Dorset countryside. How out in the sticks? Well we ran short of plates on Boxing Day, so Mike nipped outside, picked up the chainsaw and cut us some more.

Have you tasted cheese and pickle served from freshly cut wood? I’m serious when I say it was the best Boxing Day meal I’ve ever had.
A woodstove in the lounge made things unbelievably toasty. Videos sent us to sleep; the pugs kept us awake! Dale explained that Pugs were bred as clown dogs to entertain the Chinese court; all became clear. A few thousand years of tightly bred bonkers dogs…. The result? See for yourself!

End of year reports

Well, it’s that time of year again. The bit where I get a few days off, and spend it doing this. December 31st, and it’s getting near midnight… if this isn’t the time to kick back and have a look at all those shots nestling hidden on my hard drive that document 07’s rollercoaster, when is?

Oh – hang on – I can hear it all kicking off outside.

There you go. Happy New Year! Hot off the press. Here’s wishing you a fantastic year full of love, prosperity, health, joy and creativity. And the coffee required to realise it all.

Academic conclusions

It’s about time I put the other shots of Thomas Dolby up. Sorry it’s been a while, but I’ve been back and forth a bit ever since. Several concerts and rapid changes of barometric pressure later and my ears, teeth and sinuses don’t what hit them, and it takes me almost a minute when I wake up to know where the hell I am. Anyway… Thomas did two shows in London: the first at the ICA to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Sputnik, and the second at Islington’s Academy, to celebrate, I feel, or perhaps to substantiate his return to England.

He commented on the show last year at the Scala, his first since ’92, which seemed to have been a realisation moment for him that there were still a ‘hard core’ of fans in the UK and Europe that would traverse the flat earth to see him live. There was a lot of that atmosphere about the Academy gig in Islington to reinforce that earlier observation, and indeed many of the same fans.

He could not have had much doubt by the end of the concert that any release of new material would be very well received. It was also clear that while everyone enjoys the hits immensely, many of the more thoughtful tracks were the ones that had affected people deeply, with a quieter and more subtle communication passing between writer and listener. This seemed to please Dolby as much as it pleased me, and bodes well for such tracks on any forthcoming release. It must be a great feeling to know that there are people who will really listen to what you put into a song; what an encouragement to express something honest and worthwhile. There will always be 3 minute pop hits, but the audience for them is now far from pivotal, and there are so many equally populated and supportive genres. It’s a good scene.

The show itself felt assured, less on tenterhooks than the ICA, which makes sense, having been road tested. The lighting was better (which pleased me no end) if still a little primary – beginning : blue; songs about hot sauce : red; subaquatic themes : green. I would love to have seen more use made of projections – why not more than one screen? Why not use the stage and musicians as a backdrop? Mix in the images from Thomas’ headcam? Stacks of 50s TVs? Lots of scope for rich visuals there, and the music lends itself so well to dramatic and atmospheric technologies.

But I learned from my experience of the ‘primary’ burnout of the lighting at the first gig, so I was prepared this time with tricks up my sleeve. I hope some of the images bear this out. Most of all I’m looking forward to setting a couple of shots up in the near future. I have one or two ideas… we didn’t get a chance to shoot anything in the afternoon before the gig as the possibility came up for some old friends to play that night, and the afternoon was needed for rehearsal.

First up were Thomas’ first touring band members circa Flat Earth era, guitarist Kevin Armstrong and bassist Matthew Seligman. Personally great to finally meet Matthew to whom I’m musically linked by 2 degrees of separation (but that’s another story!).

Joyful bonus of the night was Lene Lovich, in full regalia. What can I say?! Clearly worth celebrating, as TD’s headgear testifies. A few old mates of mine were there too… great to see you all, guys, it completed what I can only describe as another magical evening, and I even made the last tube home.

History and Geography

Landscape is all about time; so it’s about time I returned to my landscape. I bought a huge scanner a year ago, partly with the intention of going through all my old negs and creating digital files from them. It’s a testament to how little time I’ve spent at home this year that I’ve only scanned a handful so far.

But I’m excited about the project. I haven’t had a good look at these photographs for years. Many years, in some cases. They’ve become foreign landscapes now, and the young man who took them a stranger to me. I’m interested to see what still touches or excites me, and what has now drifted too far out into time’s ocean.

Quite often when I sit down to share some photos on this blog a theme emerges as I write. This time, though, each photograph is what it is. I could find themes, but essentially this is a project in process; I’ll be adding to it as I snatch moments to scan more shots so themes may not be apparent, or may emerge much later in the process.

And, more than at any time before, I’m baring my soul. Or certainly the state of my soul when I took each photograph. When I collaborate with someone for their portrait I hope always to reveal a little of their soul, a little of what makes them unique. When I’m out in nature or the city what I choose to connect with and the way I see it reveals my own soul, whether I will it or not. And ‘out there’ is where I find my awe, where I connect with the numinous. It’s what made me take pictures in the first place, and keeps me taking them.

So perhaps with that in mind I should let each image stand for itself and just tell you a little about the background to each one.

Two hairy blokes, one Escort estate with dodgy headlamps and a quest to get to Scotland for new year. I had flu and didn't think i'd make it. Freezing rain as we left London, then as we forged into Hertfordshire the sun broke through the dark grey mass of clouds in golden beams and Hendrix hit the radio. All along the watchtower. 16 hours later, our alcohol, cigarettes, film and hearing depleted we pulled into a carpark in heavy loch mist. We just couldn't see to drive anymore, couldn't see the carpark, or the surroundings, or the sign saying 'No Overnight Parking'. I woke up, and took the primus stove outside to make some tea. As the water boiled, some of the mist and cloud cleared and I stood up and looked across the road. This was the scene. Glenfinnan. Jacobites and all that. Another life, but this one feels close by, still. On the way home I shot Glencoe with my free hand and '51 Leica at 75mph, and we found Espedair Street. Rock and Roll.

In transit through Iceland. 4th January, as I recall, on a disastrous but heroic trip to meet my true love in Canada. Sure, it's on the way. Something like 4 hours daylight a day, and a blizzard on one of them. Awesome place, it has unique soul. I only spent a few days there, but i know it's somewhere i could make my home. I've found some negs of the blizzard - I'll scan them in soon.

Merlin's Cave, Tintagel. Where Merlin (allegedly) lived at the time when King Arthur (allegedly) held court here. Cold, tidally wet throughout and with a freezing through draft, he'd have been mental to have actually lived in here. I've slept in the caves opposite, but I can pretty much guarantee this cave got it's name from the victorian tourist office. But put that aside and breathe in the feel of the place, and the mystical atmosphere fills your lungs, heart and mind. Maybe Merlin slept in the caves opposite and used this one as his magickal office.... One day, when the island collapses, all this will be no more. Come and see it while you can.

The long cold ride home from visiting my girlfriend in Putney all those years ago. This really is another lifetime... on a pushbike cutting through Richmond Park at Robin Hood Gate, through the dark and the mist with useless lights, and out the other end, back home to Strawberry Hill, and a couple of hours kip before college next morning. I remember a shape looming out of the mist and shadows at the top of a rise, on the path beneath a tree, blocking my way: a fully grown stag in the rutting season. It opened it's mouth and a sound I cannot describe filled the park for a moment before the mist swallowed it up. We faced each other for twenty minutes before it left the path and I made it over the rise. I looked around just in case it was waiting for me, but it had completely disappeared. I'll never forget that sound.

Ok, I lied; a theme is emerging. Freezing cold. A beach in Aberdeen (which must be Gaelic for hypothermia). I went to a college with no halls of residence or any real student community to speak of, and completed my course a year or two before most of my friends, so I was at work while they were having a University Experience. Feeling I'd missed out, I'd go visit them whenever I could get time off work. This was one such visit. No sleep on the night train up to Aberdeen; greygreen twilight landscape and Marillion on the walkman, then suddenly a blazing dawn for 3 minutes as the sun broke golden above the waters of the Forth as we crossed the bridge. Then gone into grey cuttings again. Then some student times, and not a trace of respite. This was taken on the third morning, high on sleep deprivation. (Allegedly.) A cold dawn and I'd gone for a walk because I'd hit the point where i actually couldn't sleep. It was as tranquil and washed out as it looks. In that other life I spent a lot of time walking about in the early hours on my own. This image is one of only two I still have hanging on my wall, leftovers from exhibitions over a decade ago. There's a depth and soul to it when photographically printed that seems to have reserved its wallspace.

Venice on my 25th birthday. Shot with a compact camera that I was using earlier today. I was in Nice and needed somewhere warm to sleep (ok, another theme emerging, I grant you) so I went to the station to see if there were any night trains. This made total sense when I was a 24-year-old bohemian. There was one going to Vienna, but all my clothes were in a launderette and wouldn't be dry in time for that one. The other one went to Venice. Cool, I thought. I'll wake up in Venice on my birthday. And I did. Magical; the first time I'd been there. I still think it's the most beautiful city in the world. I froze my assets off coming through there on the way back to Prague from Cannes in January this year, and it blew me away again. I've decided to live there for a year when I write my second novel...

And yes, this was on the same stay in Venice, on my birthday, too, i think. The cat was ginger, and so was the upper storey of the building against which it was perched. I hand tinted a black and white print of this, and I'm not sure what became of it. Maybe i should do another.

Well, that's made a start. More autobiographical than I had expected it to be, but perhaps that's the nature of these kinds of shots. More coming soon!

Corporate Exposure

Having written about the glamour, drama and music sides of recent work, I guess it’s time to look at what appears prima facie to be the other side of the coin: corporate work. You know, ho hum, bit dull, but pays the bills and we’ve all got to do it; can’t be hobnobbing with pop stars all the time.

But here’s the thing: I actually really enjoy it.

I’m lucky really, in that I get to work a fair bit for a financial magazine that prides itself on its photographic edginess and high production values, so it’s certainly not suits behind desks. They like a bit of movement, context and character. Nonetheless, I think I still manage to freak them out a little sometimes….!

The truth is, we all like to look good. And part of the fun of that is to push the boundaries a little sometimes, to see how we could look. Why not apply a little of the glamour, drama or rock and roll to the world of business?

I look through corporate accounts and marketing publications now and then and most of them bore me stupid. They’re so slick, so worried about offending the sensibilities of anyone at all, or showing any hint of a rough edge that there’s not an ounce of humanity about them. There’s nothing personal, sexy, engaging, nothing to get the heart beating a little faster. They’re almost saying “we’ve got to produce literature with our name on it, but there’s nothing to see here – everything’s under control – move along now!” Sometimes, rather than show actual employees they even use models specifically selected to look presentable and anonymous.

So, sod that – here are some real people who actually do the jobs, and don’t often get their portraits taken. Unlike rock stars and actors who spend their lives in front of lenses and either get irritated by it or rather too comfortable these are people who are generally quite excited or apprehensive about having their picture taken, and it’s fascinating to see how many aspects of their personalities emerge in the short time allotted to each shoot.

It’s a change from their routine, and as far as I can I like to honour that, and create as much space and possibility as I can within the framework of the brief. That way there’s plenty of opportunity to be open to what is revealed. The last thing I want to do is to impose routine of my own! Plus quite often I’m flying a thousand miles or travelling by overnight train to shoot them for half an hour or so, and that makes it feel kind of special. It’s not just a quick in-house snap.

It’s something I’d like to explore, too. I’m sure there’s so much more creativity and interest that could be brought to this huge area of published images. I’d love more time to plan the shoot with each sitter, and create more context. With the limited time presently available for each shoot, the main context is usually defined by geography: how can I place this person? Where do they work? Then, what do they do which defines them, separates them from the other guys? After that it’s down to personality and lighting!

But what if I could leave the setting totally open to the sitter? What place or context do they feel best defines them? What props, people, time of day would exemplify it? Every business is different in its way, and so is every person involved in it.

Sometimes a shoot is defined by a time and place, rather than one person, but that still offers scope for a range of moods and situations.

At a time where most people feel some degree of isolation and de-personalisation within the machine there’s never been a better time to celebrate real people and real personality and reclaim business and everyday life. Maybe the corporations should think about that when preparing next year’s annual reports. After all, the decision makers at the top of every corporation are real people too.

PS - I've put an album up in the left margin to try to show the breadth of styles of some of the recent corporate shoots. It includes pension fund managers, statisticians, authors, record company bosses, marketing teams, music entrepreneurs, politicians.... in short, a range of people who do business! I'm also putting together a separate website just for the corporate side of things which will be at www.corporateexposure.eu - I'll let you know when it's up.

Catching up

Ok, I’ve been really lax on the blog update front, so I’m going to spend a couple of days sorting that out. Could be haphazard, but I’m finding all kinds of stuff, so I’ll share as I get each bit edited!

First of all one or two angels who escaped last time around. There’s more, too, just as soon as I get them scanned in. Hope you like these.

We should get a chance to see the Ice Hot girls again soon at the New Year SmartieParty, and at an exhibition that just might be happening in mid January. I’ll keep you posted on the latter as I may just have a vested interest in doing so!

Ok, stay tuned – more posts soon!

Flat Earth, elliptical orbit

Did you know, it’s the 50th anniversary of the lauch of Sputnik? Does it seem longer or shorter? Think how much the world has changed since – and maybe as a direct result. You do know that Sputnik was the first man-made satellite to orbit the Earth, don’t you? And that it was Russian, not American? The first step into our backyard of the final frontier only began 50 years ago. And I went to a gig a couple of nights ago to mark that anniversary.

This particular piece of landmark satellite communications was hosted by the amazing Mr Thomas Dolby, whose own career trajectory has been defined by the intersecting forces of cutting edge electronics, communications and music.

He has brought together pieces of footage from the early space race, and composed and performed a live soundtrack to the resulting film. Not without its challenges, as his brass section were refused entry into the UK on the day before the first performance. Bit of a launch pad blowout, but saved by the most amazing UK brass section you could hope to see or hear.

Anyway, I went along to capture some images for the wonderful people at Invisible Hands Music, his label over here, but frankly, I’d have paid the ticket price and more to get in anyway if they hadn’t asked me. Though I wouldn’t, it’s true to say, have then been wearing two large DSLRs with flashes, diffusers, battery grips and wide and telephoto zooms, and a Leica M6, 90mm Summicron and motordrive all at the same time. I’d have probably just snuck in a compact… ;-)

The reason behind the high lens loading was in case of finding myself stuck at particular orbital distances from the stage. In fact the place did get rammed, but I made it to the edge of the stage, with an unstable payload of lenses, bodies and plastic cups of beer inhabiting the same space in front of me.

The first thing I noticed was the lighting. It left a lot to be desired (like light, for instance – sorry if you’re the designer and you’re reading this, but could Thomas have been something other than orange at some point?) which presented the usual interesting dilemmas regarding movement (longer exposures) colour temperatures and pixels blown out by one colour vs underexposure and digital noise in the other colours. So…. I shot RAW and tried using a variety of exposure approaches to give some flexibility once I got to the editing stage.

And that’s where I got into some serious Dolby noise reduction! (Oh, come on, you thought I was going to hold back from that one??!) Most of the time this worked, and the shooting methods did cut me a little latitude. But after a while I got fascinated by the idea of pixels emerging from noise that we extract, connect and construct into meaningful information, in the way that we did with radio and sound with the early satellite broadcasts. So I had a little play with that, finding Thomas within the digital noise of the transmission and playing up the noise as context. See what you think.

But look, techy stuff aside, I want to tell you how amazing it was. If you were there, you already know, and if you weren’t you’ll be gutted. But it was. Amazing. The combination of images and music really brought home the reality of a time that is as foreign to me as medieval Hungary. Thomas has played with ideas and images of retro science-fiction in the past, and it’s hard when watching some of this footage to take on board that this was all real.

If the cold war was a game of dare, played not so much like swaggering pugilists, but gamblers at a table, bidding against bluffed hands, matching and raising weapons systems against each other’s ability to cover the bet and still feed their peoples, the stakes were as high as could be. The Space Race opened the betting. Out of nowhere Russia pulls an ace, and shows it to the world, broadcasts their success day and night. America responds by bragging on an iffy hand, and after ensuring the world is watching…. Folds, embarrassingly. Dolby’s footage of the collapsing American dream on it’s launchpad was glorious in its phallic impotence.

Imagine living in America then, with sputnik circling overhead as a reminder that your hallowed land no longer extended unbroken to heaven? It would be like the Aliens finally making contact and finding they speak a variant of Chinese.

Masculine pride hurt, America swings into action to erect larger and more numerous cylindrical totems, thrusting into the sky to be swallowed into the insatiable yin of space, and with occasional luck, to circle mother Earth; but only ever to spy or to threaten, with payloads of death, not life. And so the fear began.

I remember a teacher of mine recalling the day in ’62 when they turned up to school not expecting to go home that day. He said they stood around on breaks smoking and watching the sky and each other’s faces by turns. Why the hell was he at school that day? “Well we just needed some sense of normality, I suppose. What else could we do?” Grab a colleague, introduce free love a decade early and head for the coast, would have been my suggestion; but maybe in the event I’d have done exactly as he had. I hope I never have to find out.

But maybe the likelihood of never making it to retirement was just the impetus needed to launch a different exploratory mission – into sex and drugs and rock and roll. Which is where I came in (with the music side of things anyway, unless you count paracetamol). A culture of fear begets exciting times and exciting music. The orbit is complete: can we pull it off again?

And Thomas Dolby is back, too. And I must confess, I was a fan last time around. The Flat Earth was the album I most wished I’d written in that part of my life. I’ve watched his elliptical orbit take him from pioneering electronic music in the 80s, to the far reaches of mobile communications technology throughout the 90s and early naughties in far off strange lands and now swing him back to music and England again, with what I like to hope is a centripetal inevitability.

It’s good to have him back. I wonder what else we can expect?

PS - There are some more photos in the post about the Islington Academy gig, and in the albums for the ICA and Academy in the sidebar on the left.

Identity issues

I’ve been thinking a lot about identity recently. It seems to have emerged as a theme amongst friends and colleagues too (relationships and tax came close second and third, of course, but I’m at the age where my blood pressure pilots conversations toward calmer waters).

So much of our perception of ourselves seems almost dictated by the way others perceive and interact with us that it can seem almost like a second hand coat or a christmas jumper worn so long that we cease to see it, no matter how garish or ill-fitting it might be.

How about this one: I’m not really creative. I wore that one for quite a while, and I still find locks and knots from that particular hair shirt adhering to newer garments. Why? Well, I can trace it’s lineage back to my dad imposing upon me a side-parting and short back and sides, marching me down to ‘knives’ of Fareham to have it carved upon my block (wonder if those 70s condom ads are knocking about anywhere on ebay?) and buying me a briefcase for school when all the other kids had Adidas sports bags. When I arrived there, I’d sit next to my best friend who was and still is a gifted artist. He was creative. Wheras I was groomed for business, literally. But why does it take so long to shift?

It got me thinking about actors and headshots. How do you choose what to convey if you are in the business of wearing other people’s clothes? Do you focus upon the facets that seem to shine brightly, even if they doom you to parts that you find dull? If your career and life depends upon it, when do you play the part of someone you’ve never been? And how?

I was talking with my friend Rebecca when we did a few new shots for her as she stepped back into the river of drama again. Same name, same profession, but a new person stepping into new waters. How to approach it? I was struck by how different the feel was between looks, all shot in an hour in one place. I think actors realise something earlier than the rest of us – that what we perceive of ourselves as solid, immutable is actually dangerously, excitingly malleable and open.

People used to talk about ‘finding yourself’; but that feels rather ‘off the peg’, pre-formed and passive. I think the process should be more proactive. When it comes to crafting my own identity, I’d like to think I’m creative.

Number 1

Big congratulations go out to Newton Faulkner this week. Shooting up through the charts on three successive weeks, he just knocked Elvis off the top spot.

But I mean – ELVIS! Not enough to be number one in the UK album charts he gives the big E to the Big E. ‘The King’: down to number 2.

So this is my moment of vicarious smug. Didn’t I tell ya? “That boy’s going to the top” I said. Just remember where you saw him first, folks!

So the question is, all you would be stars out there… those who’ve already looked down the barrel of my lens, and those who are still thinking about it… who’s next for the top slot?