Isolation
It’s been months since my post. I didn’t even mention the two exhibitions I contributed to before lockdown occurred. They’re a hazy memory now. They were Postcards from Great Britain at Hotel Lion d’Or, Haarlem, Netherlands and the International Winter Exhibition at The Glasgow Gallery of Photography. I had other plans too but, ah, nevermind those.
I started drafting this post at the beginning of May (it’s now almost mid-June). I don’t know what I was going to write about then. The subsequent days all merge into one. Fuzzy, sun and rain soaked, slow, repetitive days. With any spare moment I’ve been growing things with success (plant and seed swapping too) and fixing up gaping wounds that some lowlife scaffolder and builder left behind in the winter. Ever since the season popped into life, I’ve been reminded of what a much wiser woman told me recently; May always feels busy because nature goes wild.
I immersed myself in it when having to quarantine for a couple of weeks. I worked on lumens, cyanotypes and installed solargraphs all with a focus on the natural world. As soon as I could go on daily sanctioned walks I took my camera out and about, aimlessly looking for nothing. The deeper joy came in listening to birds and the silence. When it reopened I started walking around my local cemetery again, marvelling at the cow parsley overgrowth. The world has changed. Even on the darkest days, there is a hint of promise for what might happen.
Here’s a few pictures from the last 80 days.
Lomography interview: Escapism Through a Viewfinder
Thanks to the magnificant Lomography for this lovely piece.
‘Inspired by the freedom of larges places in London, Laura Ward seeks for peace and serenity in small things. For her, photographing in film has the power of slowing people down and make them consider wisely each frame to be portrayed.’
2019 photography review
The scaling back that I’d intended for 2018 finally took place in 2019. It’s by far the most important and polarising year for me personally.
I gained a couple of interesting clients that I’m really pleased to be working with. I spent more of my free time up north in Scotland and Yorkshire photographing glass houses and coast lines. For the first time in what feels like a decade I’ve been able to stop the ‘monkey brain’ noise in my head and live at a different pace, allowing me to look more objectively at what I want to do with my creative output.
I’ve been looking back at my favourite pictures since 2009. 10 years ago I was fully immersed in Flickr, but this year I’ve surrended by Pro account. It’s sad to think the site may not survive.
These photographs are some of my favourites taken with Olympus Trip 35, Canon AE-1, Konica C35 and a Canon 6D.
I feel open to new projects, but I just don’t know what all of them are yet.
Go here for 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009.
A different kind of winter
For two months I’ve been spending hours pushing my daughter around West Norwood Cemetery as she sleeps. Wintery walks in every weather are the best.
Roof in the Rosemary
One week can change your life, your outlook, the way that you feel and the way that you look. I’ll be feeling this moment for years to come. For now I’ll call it Roof in the Rosemary.
Recovering
My wise friend Sally told me that once you put something out into the world, you can’t really take it back. The internet is such a weird place now. More than 10 years ago I was naively publishing just about any crappy picture, wearing my heart on my sleeve and not caring who read it. These days barely anyone reads blogs and I put very little out into this space. Recently Nick Cave said ‘as artists, you have a duty to put art out there’. He said this in response to a question about writer’s block. He’s an exquisite, rare human with a smart in-built editor and intuition for moving, poetic truth. Currently all I want to do is delete things. I wish it wasn’t this way. I am trying to be more like you, Nick.
I took today off work and promised myself not to look at emails. I didn’t want to think about anything other than the scraggy feral cat in my garden and whether my frogs would make it through the summer. I went to visit a stump of this local(ish), much loved tree which was felled last week. And then I had pangs of nostalgia for the days I’d visit the park and just sit on the grass, looking at it. The tree had run its beautiful course in life and it felt macabre to admire its broken, majestic trunk.
Things are still and purposeful today. I can smell jasmine as I watch a (rescued) climbing rose spring out bright pink immature buds. My beans are growing and there’s tomatoes on the way. I’ve ordered some rolls of film, wondering when I’ll get back into the swing of making pictures. Since my last (unplanned) stint of waiting rooms earlier this year I’ve lost some of that urge to shoot. It hit me hard and I needed time to stop and watch tadpoles every day, to pick raspberries and to be present.
Having said that, last month I received an exciting commission to take pictures at Abbey Road studios for the arm of Universal Music producing soundtracks for TV and film. That was pretty special.
Here’s a few snapshots.
Motion
Every year I shoot one or two BW rolls. Here’s a few old BW motion picture 35mm photographs.
Kathryn Joseph for Oh Comely
I met Kathryn Jospeh to take pictures for Oh Comely late last year when the winter season had begun its stern grip.
Suggesting the feature to lovely Frances at Oh Comely was made on a whim after I shared a bottle of red wine with my friends Nemone and Fleur - both of whom nudged me to do it. I’m a fan of Kathryn’s and thought she’d be perfect for the magazine. Luckily, they all agreed and I found myself collaborating with writer Jessica Furseth ( you can read her feature here). I’ve known Jessica for a few years and I thoroughly enjoyed reading her piece and found parts of it relatable. “At 43, you could call Joseph a late bloomer, except that she’s always been making music – just, you know, for herself”. I feel this way sometimes about my own work. It also reminds me of a recent comment by a man who said all of his favourite photographers were women in the 40s plus who were mothers. He couldn’t understand why they were overlooked in the bid to find the next hot young thing. Parental status aside, age affords plenty of stories.
As for the photographs of Kathryn, I prefer to shoot in natural light but I knew ahead of time that we’d be doing these pictures at night. The only option I had was to shoot on cinestill 800 and find whatever light was available. Lit stairways, light bouncing through windows and a bright bathroom.
Kathryn is currently on tour in the UK.
Kathryn Joseph for Oh Comely, issue 47
Kathryn Joseph for Oh Comely, issue 47
Cover by Hülya Özdemir.
2018 photography review
I’ve come to look forward to my annual year in review. I’m not much of a blogger but the odd scraps I write up here are getting a bit better. My website has had a little face-lift too with the addition of a ‘places’ section and a general tidy up.
Last year I wrote that I’d be scaling things back in 2018 which is funny now that I think about it. I’ve packed in more this year than I ever have before. I knew I had to focus on other things, but the universe didn’t really agree with those plans.
Some of the things I’ve been up to, in no particular order…
I exhibited six times. Four times with Shutter Hub (The Shutter Hub Open at 5&33 in Amsterdam and Truman Brewey in London, Because We Can at Festival Pil’ours in France and Girl Town Tel Aviv, at Alfred Gallery in Tel Aviv), a co-headline exhibition called Dino Island and The Lake with Nik Strangelove and at the British Museum Staff Art Show. I was also featured at FIX Photo Festival at Menier Gallery
I moved house and couldn’t stop photographing it
The super hard-working power house Karen Harvey of Shutter Hub asked me to curate an exhibition called Out of the Ordinary which is on until the end of January
I was 2nd in the judges vote for Women of the Year at FIX Photo Festival
I went to Italy to do a little photography work, and onto Zurich after that to photograph a party
Lomography gave me a Diana 120 to test
I pitched an idea to a magazine, they said yes, and it’ll be published in February 2019.
I’ve just finished working on something with Stylus Boy
I was fortunate to be on the long list of nomations for the Hundred Heroines
One of the non-photography projects I’ve worked on this year has been a pre-requisite for getting to the next stage of something really huge. I’ve gone back chronologically and written, in great detail, about every significant moment in my life and how it made me feel. Doing this kind of work would feel really self-indulgent if not for the fact that someone, in a very professional capacity, needed me to do it. This coincided with winning a place on a cross-boundary leadership programme. If that doesn’t sound like your cup of tea, I can assure you that I didn’t think it would be mine either. Both of these non-photography related things have been really magical in ways that I hadn’t expected. 2017 closed a few doors for me, but this year they swung back open again.
There are a couple of things in my notebook for 2019. Let’s see what happens.
These photographs are some of my favourites taken with Olympus Pen EE2, Canon AE-1 and Diana 120. Go here for 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009.
