Ryan Mills is a fine art photographer based out of Spokane, Washington. Currently, he works with 4×5 black and white film making provoking and emotional portraits of his friends and family, primarily concentrating on children.  Read to learn why he works with large format cameras and about his time spent with legendary photographer, Jock Sturges.

Josh Campbell: How did you get started?

Ryan Mills: I came to photography in a roundabout way. I wasn’t interested in art in high school. I did youth works? And we did photography first and we’d hang them up on the wall—photography from floor to ceiling. After doing that for a while I really began to enjoy photography. At the time I was working at a thrift store and I had more cameras than I knew what to do with. There was no real skill involved at that time for me. Just a lot of clicking. I did what I could and slowly it evolved into something that I really got into. When I switched jobs I ended up selling a lot of the gear I had accumulated and I got out of the habit for a couple of years. Then digital photography started becoming prominent. I got a digital camera and started shooting with friends. In the last few years its grown into a serious endeavor. At the beginning I shot everything from weddings, to the elderly, to dogs, to landscapes. Over time I began to slowly focus on people, which is what interested me most.

© Ryan Mills
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Josh Campbell: Are you a full time photographer?

Ryan Mills: No, at this point its about the art side of it. Making money in photography has become much more difficult these days. Anyone can buy a digital camera and call themselves a photographer and there are even cell phones that can take acceptable photos. Its really changed the game. Where I live, there is an over-saturation of photographers who charge $25 for an hour session. It’s difficult to make money doing it unless you’re in a large market. What qualifies as a good image is lost because everyone is exposed to so many photos. You see this happen on Facebook all the time. Back in the day, a really good film shooter had a particular look. Nowadays, everyone’s shooting with a digital camera and it all looks the same. Art photography is my main consideration and my goal is exhibition in galleries.

Josh Campbell: How do you get into large format photography? Do you use a 4×5 or bigger?

Ryan Mills: I use a 4×5 camera. It’s gotten to the point where 10 shots will cost you $100. I’d really like to got up to 8×10, but its going to depend on what the market does. It has a lot to do with cost. While shooting digital, I was always trying to get a particular look. I spent a lot of time studying photography masters from the 30’s and after and trying to replicate that look. I couldn’t get it with digital. My interest in large format came from a desire to achieve that look and make really big prints.

© Ryan Mills
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Josh Campbell: Why do you prefer shooting large format and how does it change the way you photography?

Ryan Mills: With large format, you really have to stop, think about and look at what you’re going to shoot. You can’t just click away. Ever since I’ve gone to 4×5 I take far fewer photos, even when I shoot digital. During a session, I usually shoot 15 sheets of film, 25 sheets max, depending on the attention span of the subject. You have a lot more conversations with people by using a large format camera. They are more relaxed, which is counterintuitive because they have to sit there for a while. There’s a lot more time for conversation while I prepare the equipment and I get a more natural photo. I take a photo and we talk for a few minutes while I’m moving things around. Eventually I see something and say, “Oh yes! Hold that look.” I take the shot, we talk a little more, and we repeat the process. The flow of it works best for what I do.

Josh Campbell: Is the bulk of your work commissioned or self assigned?

Ryan Mills: Most of it is personal work and done with my friends and their kids. Its almost always someone I know. I don’t take a lot of cold calls. People see what I do and expect that I can make it happen with anyone. However, most of the work I make is based on the relationships I have with individuals. I work on a different level with them than I could with a stranger. Its hard to get the same dynamic withsomeone I haven’t met.

© Ryan Mills
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Josh Campbell: How do you find subjects?

Ryan Mills: About half of them are people who I know and ask if I can take some photos of their kids. Or I might approach them if their children have the right qualities. I have about 15-20 subjects I’ve been shooting for 5 or 6 years. Every summer I go through the list and find time to photograph each one.

Josh Campbell: What makes a good subject?

Ryan Mills: There are conceptual photographers and emotional photographers. I find myself on the emotional side. It’s more about connections with people rather than trying to project something on them. When I’m picking a subject, it’s not about an idea that I have for them. Jock Sturges told to me, “to watch your model move through space”. If you pose them, then you’re pushing yourself on them and not capturing how they really are. I’m looking for someone who’s relaxed and open and not trying to project something. That’s why I work with kids so often. Adults often show what they want others to see and not who they are. Kids always show who they are and are a lot easier to work with.

© Ryan Mills
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Josh Campbell: Do you use artificial or natural lighting?

Ryan Mills: I don’t do a lot of studio work. During the winter months I experiment with it, but I find it very sterile. I’ve seen people achieve very dynamic lighting in the studio, but I can’t get it and its not really my thing. I use natural light in all of my work. I don’t even use reflectors. It’s all about finding the right light. When I go to a place, most of the time I’m seeing problems left and right. Once you find a place with the right light and the right background you tend to use that one spot quite a bit.

Josh Campbell: Do you consider yourself a photographer or an artist?

Ryan Mills: I think both terms get thrown around way too much. I don’t feel accomplished enough to consider myself an artist. But a photographer is just someone who can use a camera. However, if I had to pick one, it would be photographer. To become an artist requires years of mastery which I just don’t have yet. A big part of meeting Jock was to see what a real artist is like. Where I live, I don’t get a lot of opportunities to meet a lot of big artists. It gives you a greater respect of what it means to be an artist when you get to talk with them. They talk about their work differently than a photographer who just shoots family photos. For now I call myself a photographer, but the goal is to become an artist.

© Ryan Mills
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Josh Campbell: Why did you choose photography?

Ryan Mills: I’m fascinated by people. Capturing something real is my goal every time I shoot. I have studied other forms of art—painting, sculpture, etc. But I just keep coming back to photography. There’s a level of realism that just isn’t there when I look at paintings. However, sculpture has interested me quite a bit. There’s a lot that goes into a sculpture. You’re working with something bland, you have no background, nothing around it, no shadows. You have none of the things that make a photo work. Its impressive when you see a sculpture that works.

Josh Campbell: What do you like best about being a photographer and what do you find most challenging?

Ryan Mills: The best part is working with people. I like the social aspect, which is a little strange for me. I’m not a very social person. Photographing people is the time I get to socialize. I love photographing my friends. I don’t get to see them very much and photography is the only time I get to spend with them.

The challenging part is getting consistent lighting. The quality of light changes the impact of a black and white photograph and finding it can be difficult. I try to scout locations beforehand, but it doesn’t always work out. When the location doesn’t work, you shoot something just to make sure the model doesn’t feel as if there’s something wrong with them. It’s important to reassure your model and make them feel comfortable. When you’re making mistakes, you have to be sure they know they aren’t doing anything wrong.

© Ryan Mills
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Josh Campbell: What’s the most important rule for you to stay true to?

Ryan Mills: I don’t necessarily have rules when I photograph. In the art world, there are a lot of ideas of what should be art. When I first started shooting digital, nobody in the art world would take you seriously if you weren’t shooting film. Now, there are some contests that won’t accept your work if you enter with film. The rules that used to apply don’t anymore. In the end I think it’s about the final product. It doesn’t really matter how you get there as long as the end result is good. On the digital end, they shoot so that it looks good on the screen and not the print. My only rule is to create something that’s of high quality in the end product.

Josh Campbell: How do you know when a series is finished?

Ryan Mills: I don’t think anything is ever final. My goal is not to get 6-10 photographs and call it a series. My work is intended to go on for a while. I’m looking at projects that are going to span time. I’ve got a friend of mine who just had a baby. By the time this kid is 25 I’d like to have 25 years worth of work and then I’ll feel like I’ve got a completed piece.

© Ryan Mills
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Josh Campbell: What are some artists that inspire you?

Ryan Mills: Such a tough list, I have been inspired by a lot of my betters over the years. But there are a few that have had a direct profound impact, Jock Sturges, Sally Mann and Mary Ellen Mark. They have all had a way of capturing life in a that feels very real, something I have great respect for. I spent a week in France working with Jock Sturges. His input was invaluable.

Josh Campbell: Where do you see your artwork in 5-10 years?

Ryan Mills: I’m at the tipping point for gallery work. I’ve been networking with those who are more involved in the art community and have been able to learn from them how to have work hung. It’s been motivating to hear that my work is good enough to show in a gallery. I’ve been cautious about putting too much work out there. I’m trying to wait for my moment. I think in the next year or so the body of work is going to be there and I’ll be ready to show in a gallery. In 10 years, I’d like to have a book published. A lot of galleries won’t show work without a book, but you can’t get a book without a gallery! By then, I’m hoping my body of work is large enough that I can make the book I want to make.

© Ryan Mills
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Josh Campbell: What do you wish you had known when you first started photography

Ryan Mills: Starting in film, I struggled a lot on the technical side, something that those who shoot digital won’t struggle with because they have instant feedback of the photo. For instance, now you can shoot a variety of f-stops and immediately see the result. If I had tried to shoot 4×5 ten years ago I would have failed miserably, but learning the craft through digital was game changing.

Josh Campbell: What advice would you give to budding artists?

Ryan Mills: Don’t shoot for anyone but yourself. There are a lot of people who would say that you shouldn’t study other’s work to stay true to yourself. I don’t agree with that. Studying other photographers is extremely important. You need to pick photographers that impress you. And that list is going to change from year to year as you progress. As I look back over what I considered to be my best work from years past they’re not as impressive as I once thought. Additionally, It’s important to study something other than photography. That advice comes from Jock Sturges. For me, its been sculpture. Studying sculpture makes you more aware of what a natural pose is. Sculptures are never forced.

Ultimately, you have to find what you love to photograph and then study art.

Photos by Ryan Mills, interview by Josh Campbell.

© Ryan Mills
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Roger Ballen is one of my favorite photographer ever. His complex, beautiful and disturbing images are intense and powerful visions rooted deep inside the subconscious mind. Mysterious visions that last long time inside your brain, as vaguely unexpressed questions.

It was a great honor when Roger Ballen accepted to be art of CO-mag, and answer some question about his practice and vision.

Cat catcher, 1998
© Roger Ballen
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Fabiano Busdraghi: You studied geology and before becoming a full time photographer you worked many years searching for minerals in South Africa. Speaking about your double scientific and artistic experience, some times ago you wrote to me: “In order to create strong images one has to be a scientist and artist.”

Personally I’m extremely interested in this topic, because I’ve be a physician during some year before switching to photography. So many people I met in the scientific or art word, think as they are two completely distinct universes, while during centuries art, science, technique… where simply considered the same expression of the human knowledge.

Lunchtime
© Roger Ballen
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What is in your vision of the relationship between science and art? Why it’s important to be an artist and a scientist at the same time?

Roger Ballen: One might think of the artist/scientist analogy as the relationship between the conscious/subconscious mind. Whilst there are many overlaps, creativity has to be channeled through a part of the mind that is is rational and is able to make decisions based on experience. Nevertheless the source of creativity is based deep inside the subconscious mind.

Eulogy
© Roger Ballen
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Fabiano Busdraghi: It’s easy to see the analogy between searching deep underground and the subconscious exploration in your photographs. But I ask to my self if there is something else, something more practical and direct compared to this metaphor.

Do you think that the formal training typical of science influenced your photographic approach? What is the role of the scientific method in your images?

Fragments, 2005
© Roger Ballen
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Roger Ballen: My goal in many ways is to become a master of the medium of black and white photography. As each year passes I continue to learn more about the media and how to “express greater complexity in a state of purer simplicity”. I think my training in the field of geologist assisted me in appreciating the relationships between cause and effect which is fundamental to the scientific approach.

Fabiano Busdraghi: When they started, many of my photographer friends had a lot of artistic ambitions. After a while, -mainly because of economical constraint- they started some parallel commercial activity: weddings, advertising, etc. The problem is that little by little they become prisoner of the economical appeal of their commercial work. The resulting situation usually killed their creativity and all the their artistic ambitions.

Head inside shirt, 2001
© Roger Ballen
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You practiced photography as an hobby for many years and -as a consequence- yo wasn’t obliged to make a living out of it. Do you think that this kind of freedom was fundamental to find your way? Would you suggest to young photographer to have a parallel and completely distinct job to experience the same freedom? Or it would be better to concentrate uniquely on photography form the beginning?

Roger Ballen: I often explain to younger photographers that the field of art photography is one of the most difficult careers in the world. There are literally trillions of photographs in the world and billions of people taking photographs. In order to have any possible success in this business ones work has to stand out and have lasting impact over time.

Crouched, 2003
© Roger Ballen
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In life it is crucial to find the correct balance. Whilst “what might work for one may not work for the other”; I have stated that firstly one ought to photograph for oneself not the market, secondly that being an art photography requires the same discipline and dedication that one might apply to any other field and thirdly that it is crucial to have another profession to subsidize the costs of daily life.

Fabiano Busdraghi: Looking at your photographic production, animals are extremely recurrent: dogs, cats, ducks, birds, snakes… Some time ago I was reading an analysis of Pink Floyd songs where animals had a central part, especially concerning Syd Barret. In the book, the massive presence all kind of real or mythological fauna, insects, and animal sounds could even be interpreted as an early sign of Syd mental illness. Even if I’m not sure about this statement, I think the parallel between a band who often explored the dark side of our existence and your introspective work is evident.

Three hands, 2006
© Roger Ballen
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So, why so many of your photos are populated by animals? What is the importance of animals in your work?

Roger Ballen: For most of my life I have been fascinated by the similarities of animal behavior to human. A substantial amount of my imagery over the past decades has attempted to decipher visually the animality of the human being.

On another level, my images comment on the complex relationship between mankind and animals. It is quite obvious that this interaction is not one of mutual trust and benefit. Quite the contrary.

Scavenging, 2004
© Roger Ballen
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Fabiano Busdraghi: You have organized and diffused your work in the form of photo books. It seems to me that books are central in your production, and are the natural physical materialization of your work. Before exhibiting your work is so many galleries and museum, you already published several books, and it’s your book Platteland who drove so much attention on your practice and was a fundamental turning point in your life.

Can you explain why you have this fascination for books? What are the implication of having a photo book as the main objective? When you produce a new body of work, do you already think to it as a future book? Or after some year shooting new work, you “discover” a book editing all the raw material you gradually accumulated?

Caged, 2011
© Roger Ballen
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Roger Ballen: My career has revolved around the production of books namely Boyhood, Dorps, Platteland, Outland, Shadow Chamber, Boarding House, and Asylum. These projects have all taken approximately five years to complete.

All of the above book projects started with a word that eventually became the title to the future book. During the years that it took to complete these projects my goal was to define in a purely visual, subjective manner the meaning of the particular word. Each strong, successful photograph added another dimension to the project in progress.

A book, unlike an exhibition is permanent, it is something one can go back to over and over again. It establishes a level from which one can begin the “next climb”.

Loner, 2001
© Roger Ballen
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Gonzalo Bénard: I studied 12 years at a Jesuit’s school being an atheist since I remember myself, however, the very first photograph I knew from you was the most engaging portrait of God I ever seen. I have shown it in almost every master class I gave, as example of composition, conceptual photography, etc. But knowing you and your work, you’ve been always creating, projecting and representing your inner world, maybe as process of oneself knowledge. This photograph can be seen as an icon to a man full of faith and yet can also be an icon of a pure atheist, showing God as a nonsense dogma. The guy seems sleeping relaxed feeling protected yet giving the back to us, humanity; the dog seems asking “what the hell is going on here?”; the God himself as a wired puppet, a doll with a funny smile, and the whole environment as opposite to the golden church.

Where are the creator here? Where are you in this photograph?

Squawk, 2005
© Roger Ballen
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Roger Ballen: I have always stated that whilst some may find this image titled “Loner” disturbing; it is ultimately conveying a profound statement about the meaning and nature of the identity of God.

On a formal level the photograph is integrated by the fact that the eye of the dog is comparable to the doll, the dog and the man on the bed lie in the form of a cross, and the reverse spelling of the word God is Dog.

Untitled, 2009
© Roger Ballen
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Gonzalo Bénard: You often say that your photographs are a way to define yourself, your “psychological and existential journey”, however you do not come up on them, your real face/body is not visible in your work. Do you project yourself in the photographed beings – humans/animals? Most of your work has some kind of ritualistic mood, not coming up in the photographs yourself, are you playing the shaman, using others to project yourself in these rituals? Or going further if I may: are each one of your works a mask you use (or could use) being the shaman?

Roger Ballen: Like my photographs my being consists of endless fragments many of which I am oblivious of. Each photograph I produce reveals Roger Ballen’s mind through a camera. People fail to realize that a camera is fundamentally a tool of the mind; no different than a paint brush in the hand of a painter or a pen of a poet.

Ape skull, 2002
© Roger Ballen
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Gonzalo Bénard: Parallel yet not separated from your photographic blood you run the Roger Ballen Foundation, with which you add an important role in South Africa education for culture, with lectures, classes, workshops, dealing with people who might be a world future great photographer. Knowing by my own experience, teaching and doing workshops can be an amazing way to learn from the new ones. What do you give from you? What do you get from them? Being teaching an ex-change of minds in which everybody should learn from the others, what’s the most pleasant for you leading the Roger Ballen Foundation? Do you want to share a bit your experience on this?

Roger Ballen: The purpose of the Roger Ballen Foundation is to increase the aesthetic awareness of contemporary photography in South Africa. Unless the public becomes aware of the value of photography and begins to collect photographs it will be almost impossible for young artists to continue in this field without other forms of material support.

Deathbed, 2010
© Roger Ballen
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The Foundation has organized and supported master classes, symposiums, exhibitions, and lectures over the years all of which have been very well attended.

Gonzalo Bénard: as an art-photographer I know that a serious interview about our work can get one tired, specially when we feel we already answered most of the questions people do, and sometimes we ended up giving an interview thinking: “pity they didn’t ask about this or that as it’s important”… like the importance of having a left nipple to chat with the right one. Do you want to answer to yourself?

Gasping, 2010
© Roger Ballen
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Roger Ballen: Answering to yourself is the most important activity of an artist.

For more information and photos, please visit Roger Ballen website.

Possessed, 2009
© Roger Ballen
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To understand an artist’s work you can’t keep your eye stuck only on the image that’s worth a thousand words, and Camera Obscura gave me a click on this sentence, making me go deeper and beyond. A week ago I couldn’t avoid going to an exhibition held here in Paris, at the Centre Gulbenkian (French delegation of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation in Lisbon), and if you’re coming here, please do yourself a favour and go see it!

Gérard Castello-Lopes was born in Vichy in 1925, son of the cinema (his father, José Castello-Lopes, founder of Filmes Castello-Lopes) and music (his mother, Marie-Antoinette Lévéque, piano player), spending most of his life living in Lisbon – or between Lisbon and Paris -, being himself a disciple of Henri Cartier-Bresson.

#2 © Gérard Castello-Lopes
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I knew his work since always – I guess that I have less years of life than he dedicated to photography – but always felt something was missing for me to understand his whole work. It can be understood perfectly well the influence of the music on his work, specially piano, as he was a great piano player and composer himself, and also co-founder of the Lisbon Hot Club, the Lisbon jazz spot. This, you will find on the lines and rhythms and compositions (photo #1).

#3 © Gérard Castello-Lopes
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It can also be perfectly visible the influence he had from the cinema, in the use of light (also from Cartier-Bresson, using natural light), composition, stolen stills from a film. But still… there was something I didn’t know: his main passion and hobby and where it all began:

Water.

Under Water.

#4 © Gérard Castello-Lopes
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Gérard Castello-Lopes was a passionate autonomous diver. From the Ocean to the sea, the Atlantic to the Mediterranean, where he learned how to dive (Cannes) or near Lisbon, where he lost his friend and diver colleague Philippe Cousteau. And it was when diving that he starts doing photography with his French Foca.

Suddenly it all made sense to me, so I went back to the exhibition’s rooms to review all his main work. It’s true that he had an amazing work of light, as I wrote before natural light taught by his (our) master Cartier-Bresson. Even though there’s a huge difference of lights as the light of Lisbon is much warmer than the light of Paris. I experienced that already in my own photographic work. However, Castello-Lopes’ light is different. It’s not the usual light of Lisbon or Paris. He, somehow, brings the underwater light to his photography giving to it a special mood very characteristic on his work. That was exactly the feeling I had when seeing his exhibited work: diving in submerged cities, where water isn’t an issue for us to breath.

#5 © Gérard Castello-Lopes
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His view, or the view that he gives us is not only through his camera lenses but also through his diving armour’s glass, as if he had the gift of taking us to the place making us living and feeling it as he did.

There are photographs that you feel diving through submerged places, finding living humans there or just their presence even though being all them existing on the surface, and when on the earth’s surface feeling he brings water puddles (photos #2 and #3) or glass reflections, to give some water mood as well.

#6 © Gérard Castello-Lopes
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Gérard Castello-Lopes started taking photography while diving, but soon he realised that was not so easy, also for the camera as it had immediately to go through several complicated processes of cleaning the camera even if he had a supposed waterproof metal case with flash, so his photographs really under water became more as a frustration to him.

On the photograph taken in Scotland, 1985, (photo #4) there are two kids throwing pieces of bread to flying seagulls, however, the image I “saw” was the 3 seagulls as swimming fishes reflected on sky. A play of sea and sky, as if the sky was showing the reflection of the sea and not the opposite, that he repeated in other photographs like the one he took in Chambord, France (photo #5), in 1984.

#7 © Gérard Castello-Lopes
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Castello-Lopes projects this way his underwater world to ours.

He also brought kids diving, as I’m sure he saw them and projected them as so, even if they were just jumping and playing on any street (photos #6 and #7). They both appear to be diving and playing in deep ocean.

#8 © Gérard Castello-Lopes
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Or the photograph with the 4 priests sit down on a bench talking (photo #8), like corals in a reef, with such aquatic and organic movement they have.

And the “mermaid” looking lost as any human-fish at “Dubonnet’s sea”, taken in Paris, in 1957 (photo #9).

#9 © Gérard Castello-Lopes
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From the magnificent portrait of his mother taken in 1959 (photo #10), the piano player as a reflected bust lost and found next to a sank boat under the Mediterranean waters that he could have take while diving… to the photo he took already with his feet on earth, from above, watching the body submerged, in 1998, (photo #11) when it seems that he finally assumes he is out of his main element. He feels his feet on the ground now, after he got married and become a father of two. He explores earth.

#10 © Gérard Castello-Lopes
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And here on earth, he shoots his photograph that I like the most, in Paris, 1985. (photo #12). Probably one of his most abstract images, inviting you to be there. In this one, if you’re a follower of the rules, you’ll be disappointed, as it seems that he broke them all. Even the basic rule of thirds. The main subject is on your left side. It reminds me another one, taken by Cindy Sherman, where there’s a lonely lady on the left, leaving the line-curve on the right so you can feel yourself there, or even a blank space for someone who’s yet to arrive.

#11 © Gérard Castello-Lopes
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Some people can break all the rules: they are called masters.

Patterns were also something that attracted Castello-Lopes. But not to be repeated. They existed to be different, even if this can seem awkward or non-sense. He doesn’t photograph a pattern; he gives us the concept of patterns. Like they exist in nature, or the walls created by seaweeds creating patterns that don’t exist… as a pattern. But as a whole. So that’s what he also brought, shooting ropes left at the sand by fishermen, or even trails left by their boats, wheels and feet. Or coming out from the sea and sand, already at the urban landscape the scaffolding that is used to build, with men and by men. And with men, is also the iconic photograph of them all turned back, in line, bending, looking at the sea. In Algarve, 1957 (photo #13).

#12 © Gérard Castello-Lopes
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His marriage with Daniéle and the birth of his two children (daughter and son), brought him out of water, giving him a new universe, even if he never stopped diving in his mind and way of seeing. He was living on earth.

He now enjoys another element: Fire. Finally. That he started discovering with his series of blood at the bullfights, and later on with his other colour series of the burning scare crows (1996) (photo #14).

#13 © Gérard Castello-Lopes
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If there is a need to cut Gérard Castello-Lopes photographic chronology in 2 parts -due to his marriage and the birth of their 2 children-, there’s a first part where he never left the Water, even if using the Air element to reflect it, and the second part -after being married and becoming a father-, where he is connected with Earth. And finally Fire. Scaring the crows. Playing Jazz.

Visit Gérard Castello-Lopes (1925-2011) exposition Apparitions (photography 1956-2006) curated by Jorge Calado. Centre Gulbenkian, Paris from April 25th to October 25th 2012.

#14 © Gérard Castello-Lopes
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Text and photographs ¹ by Ian Leake.

“Nude women are only Art if there’s an urn in it. Or a plinth. Both is best, o’course. It’s a secret sign, see, that they put in to say that it’s Art and okay to look at.”

Sergeant Fred Colon speaking to not-Corporal Nobby in Thud! by Terry Pratchet.

I don’t think I’ve ever made a photograph of an urn before – not that I can remember anyway. And I’m certain that I’ve never made a photograph of a nude with an urn. Neither have I made a nude with a cherub. Nor the modern equivalents – nude on a rock, nude under a waterfall and nude in a tumbled down shack. But then again I don’t want to: Ingres had said everything that needs to be said in this style by the time he died in 1867.

Of course Sergeant Colon is a bit behind the times. Anything goes in the contemporary scene. Explicit nudity, sexual violence, and death are all labelled as art. The internet is full of it. And apparently it’s all fine just so long as there’s a naked, and preferably pretty, young woman in the picture.

Honey and Ruby
© Ian Leake
Please visit Katie’s Jump, by Ian Leake for the full size image.

I simply don’t understand it. Why do these people need to spew out this ugliness? Do they hate women? Is there so much violence in the world that it’s twisted their sense of beauty? Or is it all about money? Whatever it is, these pictures leaves me cold.

I suppose I’m a bit old fashioned. I enjoy life. I find people fascinating. I find women beautiful. And I believe that life, people and women are worth celebrating.

That’s what drives my art-making.

When Fabiano asked me to contribute an article for Camera Obscura, he suggested I pick a photograph that’s important to me and tell its story. This is the story of Katie’s Jump.

Katie's Jump
© Ian Leake
Please visit Katie’s Jump, by Ian Leake for the full size image.

Katie is a dancer. She’s about 5’5”, beautiful and, like all serious dancers, has an astonishing physique. She’s enthusiastic, hard working and has a wicked sense of humor. She’s a movie star too!

When I work with someone for the first time I deliberately set my expectations low. We try a few things, experiment, and generally mess around. This helps me to avoid pre-conceived ideas which I find are often a deathblow for creativity. It also helps to us both to understand each other and to discover what we’re going to make together.

It was no different when Katie turned up for the first time at my studio in London. We made some pictures, we drank some tea, and we chatted. What soon became clear was that although we were sure to make some fabulous posed pictures, she was someone who needed to make dynamic pictures which fizzed with her energy. This, I knew, would be a huge challenge, but a worthwhile one I hoped.

Ian Leake with his 11x14 camera
© Ian Leake
Please visit Katie’s Jump, by Ian Leake for the full size image.

To understand why this was such a big deal it’s important to understand how I work in the studio. I use big, old-fashioned, wooden cameras (imagine a Victorian photographer with a blanket over his head and you won’t be far wrong). My favorite camera uses sheets of film 8”x10” in size, although I also use 4”x5” and 11”x14” film (that’s almost as big as A3).

When using these cameras I have to slow down, concentrate, and make sure that everything is set just right before tripping the shutter. Rush the job and I’ll lose the picture. It can sometimes take twenty minutes for me to make a single exposure.

Working slowly means that I have time to consider every aspect of the composition. Does this go with that? Should it be here or there? And how does it look as a whole. (It also requires great reserves of patience and stamina from my long suffering models, something I’m always grateful for.) This drives me towards making static, sculptural forms.

Viktória
© Ian Leake
Please visit Katie’s Jump, by Ian Leake for the full size image.

Trying to use these cameras to capture movement and energy is extremely difficult. But I had made some earlier motion work with another dancer (the fabulous Oksana) so I knew that it could be done, especially with a little bit of help from serendipity.

Over the next few weeks and months we made lots of exposures. Mostly we worked using the 8×10 camera, but we also made plenty with the 11×14 (and also some digital captures). As an aside, 11×14 film costs about £8 per sheet and I only have sufficient film holders to make 8 exposures in any session. This means that the pressure to ‘get the shot’ when working with the 11×14 is high. (I should also mention that my 11×14 is a do-it-yourself camera built from scraps of old cameras. It’s very heavy, wobbles all over the place, and if you stub your toe on it then your toe will break a long time before the camera will. It’s a joy to work with!)

We made Katie’s Jump quite early in the project and it’s definitely my favourite from the series.

Nude
© Ian Leake
Please visit Katie’s Jump, by Ian Leake for the full size image.

Katie’s Jump was made using the 11×14 camera. It was a straightforward set-up: camera low down on its massive tripod, some front rise, and no tilts. I probably used a 476mm lens, although I don’t remember for sure. There were two lights: one above and to the camera’s right, and one down and to the camera’s left. Technically very simple.

Katie jumped and I tripped the shutter. The lights flashed and the image was captured. In total we did this eight times. Because I was working with film, we couldn’t review the results so I put the film holders somewhere safe while we carried on with another camera.

Developing sheets of 11×14 film is not easy. I develop a stack of four sheets at a time, and working in total darkness I slowly move the stack of film through a series of big trays full of developing chemistry. The film must keep moving, must never be allowed to stick together, and I mustn’t allow any sharp corners to scratch the delicate emulsion.

I developed the 11×14 film a few days after our session. If I remember correctly I’d already processed some 8×10 film and it hadn’t turned out as I had hoped. Given the difficulties of using the 11×14 I had low expectations.

Aphrodite
© Ian Leake
Please visit Katie’s Jump, by Ian Leake for the full size image.

Once the light sensitive steps were completed I turned on the light to see what we’d made: although the first couple of sheets were not great, hiding at the bottom of the stack was this fabulous picture. I was thrilled! It’s difficult to read body language on a negative but I was sure it was, ‘the one’. I hung up the wet negative to dry in my bathroom overnight. (My girlfriend has this funny idea that bathrooms are for bathing in, not washing and drying film and prints. Hopefully one day she’ll understand…)

A few days later I made a test print from the negative.

I only make platinum prints. I was never very good at silver gelatin printing, and machine made prints don’t satisfy me. If you’ve not seen a real platinum print in the flesh then you must search one out. If you’re in the UK then you can find them in the V&A print collection or in many fine art photography exhibitions (or you can knock on my door). They are exquisite.

It’s quite easy to make a simple platinum print, but it takes many years to master the medium. I’ve been printing exclusively with platinum for five or six years now, and have made several thousand prints – but I’m still learning.

A platinum print requires a negative that’s the same size as the print you’re making. That’s why I use those big cameras. (Nowadays it’s possible to make digital negatives which allow you to work from other formats.) Everything is done by hand – mixing the coating from platinum (usually with some palladium too), painting it on to the purest paper you can find (I use Buxton which is handmade in France by Ruscombe Mill – it has a gorgeous texture), exposing the dried paper to ultraviolet light through the negative, and finally processing it in various odd chemicals. It takes effort, concentration and a lot of commitment, but the results are worth it.

Neve
© Ian Leake
Please visit Katie’s Jump, by Ian Leake for the full size image.

Anyway, I’ve digressed. A few days after developing the negative I made a test print, and then my first ‘final’ print. It was perfect.

Since then I’ve made several more ‘final’ prints from this negative, and every one has been better than the last. That’s one of the things I love about handmade prints. Every print is different due to their inherent variability. And every time I print from a negative I learn more about it and how it likes to be presented. It’s a constant evolution.

I’m digressing again…

My current ‘final’ print for Katie’s Jump is in a very delicate high key. There are almost no deep shadows, and no blacks. The highlights have a slight creaminess to them. It’s cropped to about 13.5”x8.5” and mounted on a large sheet of Chateau Vellum paper (also from Ruscombe Mill). The final artwork is approximately 22”x15” with a mix of natural and torn edges.

So other than it being a physically beautiful print featuring a beautiful young woman who is full of vitality (but who somehow mislaid her clothes), why is this picture so important to me?

Hannah
© Ian Leake
Please visit Katie’s Jump, by Ian Leake for the full size image.

I believe that art is about gift giving. A successful fine art photograph connects the subject, photographer and viewer together through a richly rewarding relationship of gifts. The subject, whether it’s a person or a church, gives something of themselves to the artwork, the photographer gives their labor, and the viewer gives their attention. In return the viewer is rewarded with pleasure, the subject is rewarded with recognition, and the photographer is rewarded with a sense of fulfillment. The more each participant gives, the more they are rewarded.

This picture, I believe, achieves all of this. Several of my collectors have it on their wall, Katie loves it, and I still get a buzz every time I look at it.

In fact, at the risk of sounding self-indulgent, I’ve just had to take a break from writing in order to sneak a peak at my copy of this print.

Looking at it now, I’m reminded how much I love the narrow space between her body and the edge of the frame, the way her hands and knees refuse to be constrained by the edge of the picture, and the way that her expression is serene even in the midst of such a burst of energy. But I also love the delicate tones that seem to glow from inside the paper, its texture, and its absolutely matte finish. And I’ve got that buzz which makes me want to rush into my studio and make more pictures.

That’s why this picture is so important to me.

Please visit Ian Leake website for more platinum/palladium nude photograpy.

Derrière
© Ian Leake
Please visit Katie’s Jump, by Ian Leake for the full size image.

1. Note: all the pictures shown here are copy photographs of handmade prints. Unfortunately the picture quality suffers in the reproduction.

Text and photographs by Jon Bertelli.

Farewell my life, by Don Galo

I shall speak to the world and its people,
through poetry and poems;
although some cause great joy and happiness;
others cause pain, sorrow and sadness,
others cause displeasure, anger and rage.

It doesn’t matter! Such is time and life,
intricate with sadness and happiness,
anger and rage.

Farewell my life, my loyal partner;
I was a strong man, alluring and brave;
you gave me all you could offer,
thank you my life.

Day by day I’m drifting away from you;
seeking for a new joyful and eternal life,
of peace and happiness.

Farewell comrades of war,
my friends,
to you I bid this final goodbye,
farewell.

Original spanish version at the end of the article¹

Mateo Zapata, son of Emiliano Zapata
© Jon Bertelli
Please visit “Zapatistas”, heroes from the last century, by Jon Guido Bertelli for the full size image.

In the State of Morelos, during the Agrarian Revolution of the South, 1910-1920, Emiliano Zapata and his courageous fighters (men and women) battled fearlessly for the rights of their people against injustice, under the common cry of “Tierra y Libertad” (“Land and Freedom”).

I spent the greater part of the two years that I lived in Mexico, during the mid-late 1990s, in search of the last surviving Zapatista veterans from those distant years.

My search was focused in the state of Morelos, where the Revolution of the South started; Pancho Villa was the leader of the Revolution of the North.

While the “kid” of those photographed and interviewed was 99 years of age, most of the other veterans had surpassed the magic age of 100, survivors from the last century. Three of the veterans passed away a few days after I met them.

Zapata's grandson
© Jon Bertelli
Please visit “Zapatistas”, heroes from the last century, by Jon Guido Bertelli for the full size image.

They were people who left their belongings behind to follow the heroic figurehead Emiliano Zapata. Finding refuge in the surrounding hills for up to 10 years and fighting guerilla warfare, dedicated to bettering the plight of the common man.

Their hardened character for survival was forged through years of battles, bloodshed and hardships.

Not only did they give up their own lives for their ideals, they even sent their own children to continue the fight.

Always friendly, they would welcome me into their homes, where they told me about their experiences and life during the revolution.
They talked with such passion about a past so close to their hearts, as if it were a part of their present. When I learned more about these intrepid people made frail and minute with the passing of the years, they reached dimensions of giants in my mind.

Most of the veterans whom I met, had been awarded for their bravery during the revolution with the medals of Merito Periodo Revolucionario and a few also with that of Legion de Honor.

Teniente de Caballeria Don Galo Pacheco Valle

Teniente de Caballeria Don Galo Pacheco Valle
© Jon Bertelli
Please visit “Zapatistas”, heroes from the last century, by Jon Guido Bertelli for the full size image.

(Cavalry Lieutenant) Teniente de Caballeria Don Galo Pacheco Valle, joined the revolutionary forces of Emiliano Zapata in 1913, with his two older brothers and his trusted Mauser rifle. A survivor of many battles, he told me that the incoming bullets sounded to him like a swarm of bees and with a smile added that one of them bit off the lobe of his left ear. After the revolution he became a homeopathic doctor, a poet and the principal of a school in his small town of Cocoyoc. Even with the many years weighing on him, he was clear minded and still happily working as a homeopathic doctor when I met him. Not only a recipient of the Merito Periodo Revolucionario and Legion de Honor, but had also been honored by the state of California, U.S.A. He passed away in 2002; well into his 100s.

Don Vidal Paredes

Don Vidal Paredes
© Jon Bertelli
Please visit “Zapatistas”, heroes from the last century, by Jon Guido Bertelli for the full size image.

Don Vidal Paredes, born in 1898 and passed away at the age of 100. His weapon of choice during the revolution was the favorite of many Zapatistas, the classic Winchester 30-30, because of its quick lever-action firing power. I visited him on several occasions and always found him waiting for me under a portrait of Emiliano Zapata, with his Winchester in hand and a medal proudly pinned to his chest. His usually jovial eyes would become stern and fixed when telling me about the suffering of those far gone days, transporting me back in time with him. My good friend Don Vidal, passed away just a few weeks after his 100th birthday.

Dimas Leyva

Dimas Leyva
© Jon Bertelli
Please visit “Zapatistas”, heroes from the last century, by Jon Guido Bertelli for the full size image.

Dimas Leyva, born in 1892, loved life and singing corridos (Mexican popular narrative songs). A witness to the killing of Emiliano Zapata at the Hacienda of Chinameca, Morelos where his body was riddled by the many bullets fired by the soldiers waiting in an ambush.

When I first met Dimas, I found him sitting by the edge of his bed as he emerged in the darkness of the room, with only a faint light peeking through the slightly opened window. As soon as I told him that I wanted to photograph him, he quickly picked up an old print of his general, Emiliano Zapata, wishing to be photographed with him.
Being with his beloved general once again, filled him with such pride that the light in the room, appeared to concentrate on the two of them, like the spotlight on a stage.

Dimas passed away only a couple of days after I photographed him.

Cavalry General Pantaleón

Cavalry General Pantaleón
© Jon Bertelli
Please visit “Zapatistas”, heroes from the last century, by Jon Guido Bertelli for the full size image.

When I was first introduced to Cavalry General Pantaleón, I was welcomed by his thunderous voice and personality. I noticed his long bushy eyebrows; each turned the opposite direction of the other, as it having a life on their own. He was known in town for his past as a Zapatista fighter, for his lively personality, his enjoyment to work on his small parcel of land and his afternoon visits to the local “Cantina” for some Tequila.

He invited me to take a seat in his small living room, where he told me about his ideals and the battles in which he participated in. As he told me, while the many photographs and busts of Emiliano Zapata and Pancho Villa, pieces of his revolutionary memorabilia adorning the walls, appeared to be looking down at us with consent.

Suddenly he stood up, lifted his shirt to show me a large scar running across his belly and with his characteristic laugh told me that nobody believed him, that at his age, he would have survived the recent operation of removing a bullet that had been lodged in his body since the revolution. With a firm tone he said: “Mira, … nadie me creyó, pero aqui estoy mas vivo que nunca!” – “Si señor!” (“Look, … nobody would believe me, but here I am more alive than ever!” – “Yes Sir!)

José Manuel Gabino Corona

José Manuel Gabino Corona
© Jon Bertelli
Please visit “Zapatistas”, heroes from the last century, by Jon Guido Bertelli for the full size image.

José Manuel Gabino Corona, a quiet and noble man with the rank of a captain in Zapata’s infantry. Although happy to have survived the revolution, he was sad about his many young companions who had died at a young age during those dreadful years of the war.

Marcelino Anrobio Montes

Marcelino Anrobio Montes
© Jon Bertelli
Please visit “Zapatistas”, heroes from the last century, by Jon Guido Bertelli for the full size image.

Marcelino Anrobio Montes, born in 1896. Marcelino fought and rode with Emiliano Zapata from the time he was just a young teenager in 1911, until the year when E. Zapata was killed in 1919. He had a severe and piercing stare that would only relax when his wife, a niece of E. Zapata was close to him, often with her arm on his shoulders or wrapped around him. Barely visible, their dog would follow them everywhere at a distance, guarding and keeping a watchful eye on them, aware of their fragility.

Benjamin Sanchez Medina

Benjamin Sanchez Medina
© Jon Bertelli
Please visit “Zapatistas”, heroes from the last century, by Jon Guido Bertelli for the full size image.

Benjamin Sanchez Medina and his wife invited me into their home, located in the small town of Chinameca, only a few blocks from where Emiliano Zapata, betrayed by Colonel Jesús Guajardo on April 10th – 1910, was shot and fell lifeless from his majestic horse “As de oro” (“Golden Ace”). Benjamin said with a sparkle in his one good eye (he had lost sight in one), “El caballo de Zapata no era cualquier caballo!” (“Zapata’s horse was not like any other horse!”) Benjamin and his wife still looked like the perfect young couple in love.

Their many happy grandchildren surrounded us while their friends peeked through the window, wondering about all the attention surrounding the old and proud warrior.

Señora Angela Zamora

Señora Angela Zamora
© Jon Bertelli
Please visit “Zapatistas”, heroes from the last century, by Jon Guido Bertelli for the full size image.

How can I ever forget the sweet and determined girl who followed Emiliano Zapata and his troops? She joined the Zapatistas at a young age, at first carrying provisions, helping with cooking, rolling cigars for Emiliano Zapata, loading the rifles and later actively participating in the fighting. She was one of the many women who fought courageously in bringing a positive outcome to the armed struggle that they were part of.

At first she did not want to have her photograph taken, believing the photograph would rob her of her soul. Fortunately I had brought a Polaroid camera with me, I told her that I would take her photograph and give her soul back. As soon as I handed her the instant photograph and after taking a good look at it her face lit up with a big smile, she promptly positioned herself toward the warm sunlight and consented to let me photograph her.

Medals
© Jon Bertelli
Please visit “Zapatistas”, heroes from the last century, by Jon Guido Bertelli for the full size image.

More than ten years have passed since I last saw my “Old friends”, they have left us to join their companions in arms and their “El Jefe” (“The Boss”, as he was also known) Emliano Zapata. I miss their quick wits and their positive outlook on life enjoying every minute of it, their strength and their noble ideals, which still echo through the hills of Morelos and across Mexico

I’m grateful to Zapata’s family members and the families of the Zapatistas who spent countless days with me looking for the veterans, without them this project would not have been possible.

Winchester 30-30
© Jon Bertelli
Please visit “Zapatistas”, heroes from the last century, by Jon Guido Bertelli for the full size image.

A special thank you to all my friends in the state of Morelos, they made my two years in beautiful Mexico a much more personal and special chapter in my life.

Please visit Jon Bertelli website for more informations and photos.

© Jon Bertelli
Please visit “Zapatistas”, heroes from the last century, by Jon Guido Bertelli for the full size image.

1. Adios vida mia

   Hablaré al mundo y a la gente,
   por medio de poesías y poemas;
   aunque algunas causan gran gozo y alegría;
   otras causan pena, dolor y tristeza,
   otras causan molestias, furores y rabias.

   ¡No importa! Así es el tiempo y la vida,
   compleja de tristezas y alegrías,
   furores y rabias.

   Adiós vida mía, mi fiel compañera;
   fui hombre fuerte, magnético y valiente;
   tú me diste de todo lo que tienes,
   gracias vida mía.

   Me voy alejando [de] ti, día tras día;
   voy buscando una nueva vida feliz y eterna,
   de paz y alegría.

   Adiós compañeros de Guerra,
   amigos y amigas,
   de vos me despido para siempre,
   adiós.

Text¹ and photography by Steven Greaves.

The history of migration to Calais, France is a long, complicated and often violent one. Tears have been shed and blood has been spilled on the streets of this once-prosperous small town in northern France. Despite some media coverage, it is still Terre des Oublis- the land of the forgotten.

© Steven Greaves
Please visit Terre des Oublis, by Steven Greaves for the full size image.

For those asylum seekers here, the United Kingdom (about 21 miles beyond the horizon) is seen as the Promised Land. Currently, most migrants are from war-torn Afghanistan or Sudan’s Darfur region. Many have paid large sums of money to get this far. Others have walked treacherous mountain passes or crossed vast deserts for the chance at freedom. Tales of woe- family members lost at sea, beatings by local authorities, running from gunfire- are commonplace. Many are here by choice; they seek a better economic future and the possibility to send money to far away families. Others are here of necessity; to remain in their homelands would assure their death or that of their families.

© Steven Greaves
Please visit Terre des Oublis, by Steven Greaves for the full size image.

For the Sudanese population, the road leads up through Libya, across the Mediterranean and, usually, into Italy where an often hostile and racist local population awaits. Once there, the path leads to France. For the Afghans, most come across Iran, Turkey and, through the Evros border, into Europe. From there, they too make their way to France.

© Steven Greaves
Please visit Terre des Oublis, by Steven Greaves for the full size image.

Calais is the staging ground for the final push into the U.K. and a perceived better life. To have made it this far without incident is rare. To make it to England from here, even rarer. They do so by stowing away on cargo trucks, oftentimes by clinging to axels. Others stow away on trains that ply the Channel Tunnel. Only the strong, persistent and lucky will attain the dream.

© Steven Greaves
Please visit Terre des Oublis, by Steven Greaves for the full size image.

I began this project in early January, 2010 while the winds blew icy blasts down from the North Sea and snow settled on rooftops. Twinkling bulbs, green and red, illuminated the dark nights and trees stood naked in the glow. I have now seen the days grow longer and the trees budding. Children, no longer swaddled from head to toe, ride their bikes in dizzying circles and young couples walk through sun-drenched parks hand in hand. But, in the shadows, the migrants still wait their turn. They cling to a meager existence. It is one of boredom, frustration and a never-ending game of cat and mouse played out with local and national police forces.

© Steven Greaves
Please visit Terre des Oublis, by Steven Greaves for the full size image.

Most of the Sudanese take refuge in an abandoned warehouse. Skylights, in checkerboard array, dot the roof and allow the sunlight access. Through broken panes, the rain often falls. Many of the walls are destroyed in places and the wind cuts through often carrying, with it, a chill. With no electricity, the nights are dark and the only light is that from numerous fire pits. The floor is destroyed in places and gaping holes await the unsuspecting; caution is required after nightfall. There is no access to running water or toilet facilities and basic sanitation is lacking. About 80 migrants and one solitary cat live amongst the decaying detritus. Continually hassled by local police (CRS), they sleep in tents, upon wooden shipping pallets or on filthy discarded mattresses. Most live in a state of fear and constant vigilance. To be caught here or upon the streets of Calais will result in arrest or worse, deportation back to the darkest of continents.

© Steven Greaves
Please visit Terre des Oublis, by Steven Greaves for the full size image.

Until recently, the Afghan population had been sleeping and taking shelter under unused rail cars out beyond the city limits. Like the Sudanese asylum seekers, they faced daily visits from police forces, arrest and deportation. Many have worked for ISAF forces as translators or have otherwise collaborated against the Taliban. For this, death threats have been uttered and most have left Afghanistan in fear of their lives or that of their family’s. Now, the rail cars have been removed and their numbers dispersed upon to the streets of Calais.

© Steven Greaves
Please visit Terre des Oublis, by Steven Greaves for the full size image.

Despite the conditions and the sense of hopelessness, these men go on. Within the suffering, they find a humanity rare to witness. I have seen in them uncommon resilience and mental prowess even as each day unfolds and England becomes more of a distant dream.

It is a difficult world to penetrate. Migrants have seen cadres of journalists come through. Some come for a day or two, launching cameras into their faces. As the frames click by, there is little regard for their dignity. Others have come through, returned home and have published inflammatory stories bent on selling newspapers to an ever-increasing xenophobic public. There is also a fear of recognition. Their presence here is illegal and many are fearful that published likenesses will lead to arrest should they ever make it across the English Channel. The fear of recognition also extends to that of their family members. For many reasons- mostly pride- many asylum seekers tell their families that they are already in the UK, employed and are living comfortable lives. They fear that, if photographed, the realities of their plights will be exposed to those back home. Many prefer not to go through the hassle.

© Steven Greaves
Please visit Terre des Oublis, by Steven Greaves for the full size image.

Initially suspect of my intentions, I was eventually invited into their world. For days I stood on the periphery and voyeuristically looked in. Endless smiles, cigarettes, shared cups of chai and patience has closed the distance between our two worlds. As the tensions evaporated and trust was established, the camera came out ever more increasingly. Hassan, from Darfur, and Malik, from Jalalabad, were invaluable. The bonds we formed paved the way for additional friendships and access to the rest of the community.

© Steven Greaves
Please visit Terre des Oublis, by Steven Greaves for the full size image.

Their life is now my life and mine, theirs. I eat from the charity organizations as they do, sleep amongst the decay and spend countless hours staring into the flames. As the shadows dance on charred walls and silence settles in, I, too, think of a wife and loved ones left behind. I try my hand at dominos always destined to lose. Their card games escape me and laughter is frequent. We sit around and talk about home, families, their plights and the realities of life in Terre des Oublis. Unlike them, however, I do not run from the routine raids that have become ever more prevalent. I am white, moneyed and enjoy the privileges offered by my nationality. While they scramble into dark crevices, under moldering floors or over barbed wire fences and walls, I stand.

© Steven Greaves
Please visit Terre des Oublis, by Steven Greaves for the full size image.

I can only bear witness and hope that my work will, somehow, strike a chord with those that hold the pens of power. This is, however, an ambitious and extremely unlikely conclusion. Through my civil disobedience, I have further gained their trusts. They have seen me struck by police batons, rocks heaved in my direction and gloved hands rough me up. I have stood firm, all the while touting the rights of the free press, not for me…..but for them. I cannot guarantee that my work will change the minds of those that view it. I cannot assure them that the laws governing this issue will be redrafted to allow for compassion and humanity. I can, however, promise them that I will stand with them for as long as I am here.

© Steven Greaves
Please visit Terre des Oublis, by Steven Greaves for the full size image.

“Mehadeen, one cigarette!” “Mehadeen, how you?” “Mehadeen, you want chai?” It is Arabic for a kind of holy man. I am told that he is one who protects the faith and watches over the weak. It is a badge of honor, they say. “You good man, Mehadeen!” I do not ever forget the privileges I have been granted on the railroad tracks and in this abandoned warehouse somewhere in northern France. I am inspired by the courage of these men living in Terre des Oublis. I can only hope that my work shows their dignity, humanity, perseverance and strength.

Please visit Steven Greaves web site for more stories and photographs.

© Steven Greaves
Please visit Terre des Oublis, by Steven Greaves for the full size image.

1. A shorter version of this articles is available on fotovisura.

Text and photographs by Richard Griffin.

This morning, I awoke to find an e-mail requesting that I write an article for Camera Obscura, but I also awoke to an interesting sight. The house next door to mine has been vacant for quite some time, and I only recently noticed that someone moved in because I can see plants on the patio deck and at night some lights are on.

While I was waiting for the coffee to brew, I looked out my laundry room window and saw my new neighbor standing in her bedroom wearing a white bathrobe. She was standing, with the robe open, watching television and drinking coffee. I immediately recognized this moment for what my instincts told me it was: I knew she would drop the robe at any moment, and she did.

She walked around her bedroom nude, putting on jewelry and brushing her hair. Floor-to-ceiling windows surround her bedroom. She stood in front of the television while rubbing lotion on her face and body, and the light of the screen illuminated her naked features. This sort of thing happens to me from time to time, and it never fails to arouse me in a way that is hard to describe. I would rather catch such an intimate glimpse of someone innocent, in that I am not standing on a trashcan peeping through her window than to see someone standing nude on a beach.

© Richard Griffin
Please visit A Lasting Visual Image, by Richard Griffin for the full size image.

I believe that, as a society, we have become very voyeuristic, and I believe also that photography has played a major role in this development. We are bombarded with thousands of images per day. The Internet takes us into people’s lives through web sites such as Facebook, it also takes us into people’s bedrooms via live web cam sites where people, usually young women, allow us the most intimate access into their private lives. Paparazzi bring us spy photos of our favorite celebrities despite the invasion of privacy that this represents, but we look anyway.

As soon as Henri Cartier-Bresson got his hands on the new Leica 35mm camera, he forever changed the future and the approach of photography. He became famous for being “invisible” on the streets, and had a unique skill for capturing what he called the “decisive moment” in people’s ordinary daily lives. When I look through his photographs, I am awestruck at how voyeuristic they are, and I almost feel like I am “peeping” into the private lives of unsuspecting subjects.

© Richard Griffin
Please visit A Lasting Visual Image, by Richard Griffin for the full size image.

There are certain aboriginal cultures that are uncomfortable with the idea of being photographed, and they say it is like a piece of their soul is being snatched away from them. Though this may sound like they are uncivilized and ignorant of modern technology, I feel there is truth in how they feel about photography. Capturing a private or unguarded moment is one of the unique aspects of photography. Taking the viewer of a photograph to a place he or she would not otherwise have had access, helped establish photography as a viable art form.

Of course, as history has shown, as soon as the camera was invented, the form of nude photography flourished. The nude had long been the subject of painters and sculptors, but the photograph was capable of capturing a real moment in real time. The intimacy of photography is the true cornerstone of the medium. Ruth Bernhard pioneered the early nude study, and was one of the very best in the art of capturing the female nude. The two photographers who had the most influence on me are Ruth Bernhard and Henri Cartier-Bresson, because I feel that they are both capturing the secret intimate moments of people’s lives and allowing me a portal into this realm.

© Richard Griffin
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I am drawn to nude portraits because I feel they represent honest, vulnerable, and intimate access to the subject. I once visited a nude beach many years ago. All the people I met were naked when I first saw them. We had long conversations as if we had all known each other for years. There was an immediate and intimate connection between total strangers. One night, we all went to the big dining hall for dinner, and everybody was dressed in their finest. It was very strange to see them in their designer clothes sporting their pricey Swiss watches, and we all agreed that we liked each other better nude, there were no logos and trinkets to define us or to separate us into a class system.

As a society, we have forfeited our right to privacy. The minute something interesting happens to us, we use our cell phone camera to put it on our Facebook page or post it to You-Tube for the entire world to see, instant access to the minute details of our lives offered to total strangers. It appears that, for it to be real and meaningful, it has to be posted somewhere for others to see, if it’s not in pictures, it didn’t happen.

© Richard Griffin
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In some countries they have had to modify the laws governing the photographing of people in public places due to the abuse of modern technology. There are numerous accounts of people placing tiny cameras in public bathrooms or using their cell phone camera to photograph women’s legs under the table or climbing stairs. There are websites devoted to “upskirts” where men hide video cameras in shopping bags and hold them low enough to video up short dresses. The popularity of the “Girls Gone Wild” series demonstrates that, for some people, they are more than happy to bare it all just for the thrill of the moment.

As a society, we risk becoming immune to images. I have heard this said many times: Somebody looks at an amazing photograph, and instead of appreciating what it took to capture the precise instant of the moment, they say, “It was probably Photoshopped.” We are getting to the point where we don’t trust the medium without the tweaking done in Photoshop. Personally, I hate what Photoshop has done to the fine art of photography. Sure, I use it to erase blemishes and soften the effects of time-induced wrinkles, but I know I am cheating when I do it.

As an art form, photography has endured many hardships along the way. For some, photography will never be more than a nifty gadget. For me, it is the art form of my choice. It is my passion, my window into the world and the people around me. I always feel a bond with my subjects after I photograph them, and I always value the significance of the gesture when they drop their shields and give me access to their inner world.

© Richard Griffin
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I also fear that photography is always on the precipice of losing its value as an art form. We are exposed to so many images, some real, some Photoshopped, that there can exist a saturation point of no return. What images of today will be considered the timeless classics of tomorrow? Who are the new masters guarding the gateways of our practice?

I began this article describing a scene where a woman walked naked in front of her window. She did so for quite a while, and I watched the entire time, unable to blink an eye. Certainly, she knew the windows were there, and certainly she was aware of the possibility that someone out there might be watching. The feeling that I experienced best defines why I value photography as an art form. What she did this morning is now an image in my mind, or a blend of many images that I will never forget. But more than that, I had a glimpse into the quiet and private beginnings of her day when she rubs her lotion on, sips her coffee, and piece by piece, gets dressed to go out into the world to do whatever it is she does…only I was there to see it happen, and thanks to the famous images of my favorite photographers, I was there to see what they captured as well.

© Richard Griffin
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Text and photographs by Galen Schlich.

“Love of beauty is taste. The creation of beauty is Art.”

–Ralph Waldo Emerson

The desire to capture the essence of the minds eye overwhelms, and the satisfaction upon succeeding can verge on euphoric. What does it feed in us and why does it matter? These questions at the heart of creativity remain with the dedicated artist, driving them on, as if to finish a puzzle that has no end.

The craving to create or re-create beauty, or one’s interpretation of it, has always been one of the most prominent inspirations for this artistic enigma. In my own personal pursuit it has been, first and foremost, the driving factor. In this series of pictures the principal motivation were encounters with the beauty and innocence of children, something that changed me and my photographic vision. In a world full of violence, suffering and human meddling in nearly everything, this experience greatly helped counterbalance my views of existence and gave hope that there was some true human ‘innocence’ in the world. It has also raised questions about life and death, the wonder and beauty of life and the inescapable, unattractiveness of death. Using this experience, I’ve attempted to distill some of that emotion and to put it into print.

Brittney
© Galen Schlich
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If beauty is first and foremost in compelling me in this vision, then dream and fantasy are two sub-facets that I feel strongly about portraying as well. Very seldom does a straight negative contain any of these when I inspect it. In an effort to add the other dimensions, I work and re-work the image over and over again in the darkroom until I finally achieve a degree of visual harmony that I feel satisfied with. The process in itself of re-working the picture I find very satisfying, allowing me to see possibilities and subtleties that I may not have perceived before. It allows me time with the image, for it to develop and transform gradually into its finality.

Brooke
© Galen Schlich
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My captivation with early pictorialists such as Robert Demachy and photo-secessionists Alfred Stieglitze as well as Painters such as Dante Gabriel Rossetti and John William Waterhouse were but a few artists that changed the way I looked at photography and the wide variety of elements it was capable of containing. I felt the deep emotion in their paintings and photographs that I also wished to capture in my own work.

In Demachy’s work I experienced a vision not just of a simple subject but also of the artist’s true interpretation of the emotion that he wished to portray as he produced these images. Primarily through the gum bichromate process could he achieve this unique feeling to his work. The pictorialist movement at the time strove to produce soft, gauzy images that could almost be mistaken as a charcoal sketch. Photographers of this movement worked towards emulating the painters of the time and many of the artist’s work of this movement confirm this. I naturally deviated to alternative processes, attempting to create a similar visage in my images, adding characteristics to them here and there and experimenting with different techniques.

The eye
© Galen Schlich
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Apart from the aesthetics of the image, I like to utilize juxtaposition and the use of symbols. Although not prevalent in all of my work, several certainly evoke mystery and alter meanings.

An example of this lies within the simple image La Petite Ballerine. The young girl’s hands can be represented in its very basic form as a simple ballerina posture. Another possibility in this picture depicts a girl’s transformation from adolescence to womanhood. The cradling of her highlighted midsection symbolically represents the woman she is to become. The scarcity of information in this photo forces the viewer to contemplate the only facets available, the hands and torso, combined with the lighting, one senses a deeper meaning exists.

La petite Ballerine
© Galen Schlich
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In Untitled #1, fantasy and dream are the two textures that lend this picture its unnerving mood, as well as the unorthodox framing of the legs. In this photo I wanted to convey the feelings of mystery, to compel viewers to ask themselves what was happening here. As much as it is lacking in visual content, the mere feeling it conveys is enough to provide ample room for contemplation. At the same time the simple aesthetics make it easy for the eye to look at.

Untitled
© Galen Schlich
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In Girl at the Gate of Time there exist multiple symbols. The girl dressed in pure white signifies youth and purity, the cropped off eyes indicate obscurity. She could be anyone. The blossoming rose represents life. The gate, which is lighter on one side and darker on the other, represent the balance of time and transition from youth to death. She also has a small bandage on her right hand that, even though she is youthful and pure, suggests physical and emotional suffering throughout life.

Girl at the gate of time
© Galen Schlich
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In these pictures my hope is not to explain or offer a clear-cut meaning to an image but to convey a feeling or elicit questions from the viewer, often times where there may exist no answer. In mystery there lies the potential for deeper reflection. Explanations for images can often ruin the chance for the viewer to inwardly identify with the image. In Robert Hirch’s book, Photographic Possibilities the author sums it up:

“Pictures possess their own native structure that may defy explanation, regardless of how many words are wrapped around them. They remain a purely visual phenomenon that can elicit unique responses from both makers and viewers. Those who are compelled to make pictures understand that visual communication has its own vocabulary or language.”

Baudelaire's dualism of beauty
© Galen Schlich
Please visit Deviant Elegance, A quest for beauty and the inner image, by Galen Schlich for the full size image.

My aim is to maintain simplicity in an image while providing complex intuitions as to what it may represent. The adage, “A picture is worth a thousand words” is a true, if not a cliché, expression. Adding vast amounts of literature to a concept or an image destroys much of what an image is intended to do; to allow the viewer to think for themselves. In a world where we are bombarded and saturated with countless images on a daily basis, I must constantly remind myself that in this complexity, which is the world today, lay the irony best left articulated by Frederic Chopin:

“Simplicity is the final achievement. After one has played a vast quantity of notes and more notes, it is simplicity that emerges as the crowning reward of art.”

Please visit Galen Schlich website for more great photographs.

The Dreamer
© Galen Schlich
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Following text¹ and photographs by Alexandra Demenkova.

1.

I started to do my first photographic projects in Russia, in Saint-Petersburg and in the region, near the town where I was born. It happened naturally because of the fact that I didn’t have an opportunity to travel at the time, and it turned out to be a great advantage – I knew about the places which remain non-existant for most people, thus, in a way, I photographed a parallel reality. This became a continuous quest for exploration – meeting people who live hidden and unnoticed by society. One of the first places I went was an old people’s home.

Mental hospital in Peterhof, Russia, 2005
© Alexandra Demenkova
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This experience was eye-opening for me. It made me realise a lot of things, it made me think how fragile this world of relative stability created by our families is, how thin is the borderline between health, both mental and physical, and sickness; the normality of everyday life and misery; freedom and lifetime imprisonment. In the stories and in the lives of the people I saw hope and despair; all the possible emotions and situations that I heard or read of, now were not on the pages of the books, on a television screen, on a theatre stage, but here they were, in front of me, real, the first-hand experience of life, without any intermediaries.

Garbage dump in Kingisepp, Russia, 2006
© Alexandra Demenkova
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Then I was able to expand, to do some travels to different regions of Russia, to start realizing what a huge country it is and come to thinking what this component is, besides the territory and language, that unites us and is common for all of us. Sometimes it felt like there was none, as if I was on another planet, even if I was in a village two hundred km away from Moscow. I met people who never traveled outside their villages; they would dream of going to Moscow or Saint- Petersburg, but would never be able to realise their dream.

Mental hospital in Neppovo, Russia, 2006
© Alexandra Demenkova
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2.

Since I was a child the most remarkable time was holidays, travels by train across the country. Not the ones with my mother, those were rather regular ones, we always went to the same place and met the same people – my grandmother, my grandfather, my aunt, my cousin. No, these were not real adventures. Real adventures were when I traveled with my father or my grandmother, my father’s mother. Then, I had more freedom. And there was more variety in our trips. We went across the country to various places, staying with different families all the time. Both my father and grandmother were really good with people. For me these trips were the first experience of communicating with strangers of different ages, normally, adults, and making friends with them. I would walk along the coach and talk to other travelers or go to the compartment of the train attendant and talk to her (normally, it would be a woman). And, surely enough, I was thinking, I would like to do this job, when I grow up.

Mental hospital in Neppovo, Russia, 2006
© Alexandra Demenkova
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The trains, the railway stations, night stops, arriving to new places at night, eating there, sleeping in a new bed, these things filled me with happiness, curiosity and impatience. The sound of the train departing, changes in the rhythm of the wheels, made my heart beat quicker with new expectations.

As I was growing up, I believed, the childish freshness of perception and emotions would disappear, but, time after time, they proved to have remained the same.

Gypsies, Novosokol'niki, Russia, 2006
© Alexandra Demenkova
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When we would arrive to a new place, a village, I, normally shy and quiet, would go totally out of control, sometimes scaring animals at farms where we stayed, and once misbehaving till the point that relatives asked my father not to bring me there anymore. And, however seriously I promised my father and myself to behave, I was hardly ever able to keep the promise. There was something in the air – the smells, the atmosphere of the whole trip that prevented me from being quiet and well behaved. I would have fun at village weddings along with everyone else, watch and contemplate, see situations occurring amidst this wild merriment and drinking. All this filled me with excitement and desire to blend with it and be part of it.

Gypsy chidren, Iskitim, Russia, 2006
© Alexandra Demenkova
Please visit A parallel reality, by Alexandra Demenkova for the full size image.

3.

The places I go now come into being by chance – a conversation with friends, a childhood memory, a talk between some strangers…

I hear a name of the place that sounds as an invitation, which is full of mystery and seems to come from a fairy tale. Say, “Unezhma”, a word tender and scary at the same time – a disappearing village on the White Sea, a remote one; to get there one needs to walk across the woods the whole day, and in winter you can’t get there or out of there at all. Or, a mental institution in a village; people in my place would make jokes of it, but none of us would ever go there and see what it is like. These are the places that would suddenly become fascinating for me. They would provoke in me an irresistible desire to go there.

Gypsy children, Iskitim, Russia, 2006
© Alexandra Demenkova
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You don’t know where you are going to sleep, whom you’ll have to share the room or even the couch with, if there would be any transport to get there or if you’d need to walk. Likewise, if you would be accepted, assumed to be a friend or an enemy, received as a stranger or as a fellow human being. You don’t know if people would trust you or be rather suspicious. You don’t know for how long you’d be able to stay there, or, for how long you’d want to stay. If by the time you’d leave you would be tired and longing to go away, or regret that you, presumably, are leaving forever, and would never see the people again, if you’d forget them and live on as if you never knew them, continue your own life just the same way as you did before, visit new places, whereas they would always stay there, till the end of their days, carry on their life with the very few changes, until they would die some of age or illness, others of drinking surrogate alcohol or in car accidents…

Funeral feast, Asureti Georgia, 2007
© Alexandra Demenkova
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But, sometimes, a phone call that seems surreal, a voice of a gypsy girl who accompanied me in one of the villages and who is going to marry soon, at the age of fifteen or sixteen, but, surely, long before she turns twenty, appear to be a small thread that connects us.

But, otherwise, there is an invisible thread that connects us forever; it is memory. And this thread, this connection exists even if there are no phones or computers or e-mails, no way to communicate at all. And, it seems impossible that there are places not connected with the outer world in any way.

Two buckets of water, Unezhma, Russia, 2007
© Alexandra Demenkova
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You may feel sorry for the people who live like that, in the everlasting poverty and without hopes for changes, but you feel happy that such places exist and you see that people who live there give each other and their children all their care and human warmth, instead of having computers as their best friends and scarcely talking to each other as it often happens in our homes. They are still able to gather around the table and talk for hours, and then, as there is no electricity and as you are far away from well lit with electric light cities, you can watch the stars, millions of stars, and feel that you are part of the universe.

A boy getting out of the water, Kastornoe, Russia, 2008
© Alexandra Demenkova
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Progress is a good thing, of course, and poverty should disappear once, and there should be left no places like this, but how great it is that that there are thousands of small and godforsaken places on Earth of which we never heard of and which we would never visit, but they exist, lost in space and time.

Maybe, once, they will become less poor, they will have houses with electricity and running water, and refrigerators, and microwaves, and many other things that we normally have, but would it make them any happier?

A shepherd and a horse, Krasnaya Dolina, Russia, 2008
© Alexandra Demenkova
Please visit A parallel reality, by Alexandra Demenkova for the full size image.

4.

For me photography became a means of dealing with people. It is one of the forms of communication and comprehension. I go to places and face situations which I wouldn’t encounter otherwise, without my camera. Sometimes I ask myself, what could be another capacity of mine that would allow me to meet the people, that could serve me as a licence to enter their lives, and I don’t find any answer.

Romka and Dimka, Kastornoe, Russia, 2008
© Alexandra Demenkova
Please visit A parallel reality, by Alexandra Demenkova for the full size image.

Sometimes I feel like a magician, sometimes – a worthless person who bothers them without any reason. In any case, I am glad that photography has happened to me; I became more than a spectator at the same time remaining only a spectator.
I think photography suits my temper a lot – I like the fact that every single picture is created in a fraction of a second.

When I photograph I feel much better than when I don’t. It is as if I start to feel the firm ground under my feet, or I forget that it’s not there at all. I believe, this explains everything.

Please find some more great photographs on Alexandra Demenkova website.

Woman in the field, Strugi, Russia, 2007
© Alexandra Demenkova
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1. Already published on the paper magazine “Kaze no Tabibito”, 2010 №6, vol.40, “Find the root”, Eurasia Travel Co., Ltd.

Text and photographs by Ole Brodersen.

Zero eight, zero eight, zero eight at twenty hundred I embarked ”Ejdern” and also embarked on one of the greatest journeys of my life. “Ejdern” was built in eighteen ninety-four as a sailing pilot boat. We were to circumnavigate the Atlantic Ocean. Four guys, one year.

When people ask me how it was, I answer salty, maybe because it was the only constant ingredient of the trip. But I think I answer it because there is no simple way to explain how it was. I changed though, somewhere, somehow. This series of photographs, and text, contain an explanation, or proof of why, where and how and such.

© Ole Brodersen
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Photography is very personal for me, and I feel I learn about myself through the process of taking pictures. I shoot with film for many reasons, but partly because I like the time it takes until you have the picture in front of you. It is easier to see if you‘ve been able to capture the feeling you had when you took the shot, if you have some time in between to consider it.

© Ole Brodersen
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When you‘re on such a trip, the need for a project of some kind is important. At least for me. It‘s not that I needed proof of being on the boat; I just needed something firm that I had created while being there. This is why the result of our dinghy-capsize in Cape Verde hit me that hard. My Leica was broken. I had to ship it to Germany to get it repaired. This meant that I was going to cross the Atlantic without this project of mine. Maybe I already felt I was changing, and understood that the camera was my way of understanding that process. It would be 5 months until I saw my beloved Leica again, on Cuba. I cried.

© Ole Brodersen
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I survived though, mentally as well, across the Atlantic from Cape Verde to Brazil. Seventeen days. And luckily, in more than one way, I got my hands on an Olympus OM1n. I only used the Leica while on land after I got it back. I don‘t think I brought anything that didn‘t break in one way or another. So did the OM1 as well of course. I had to get a new one in NYC. And thus it became a repeating message to all our visiting crew: Do not bring anything you care about on board. Or at least consider whether the joy of spending more time with something of high sentimental value exceed the sadness of breaking it.

© Ole Brodersen
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In the middle of our second crossing of the Atlantic Ocean, from Newport to the Azores, my best friend died. We had two more weeks to go, when we got the message from Norway. Ironically, he had drowned. There was no chance in hell to get to shore on time to get to the funeral. Our only means of communicating was when people called us, we could not call anyone. I was able to write down some words though, which another guy on the boat had to read to my mother. I couldn‘t manage.

After 25 days, one storm, and one death we reached the shores of the Azores.

© Ole Brodersen
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I keep wondering if the loss would have been easier if I‘d been with him until the end. I hadn‘t seen him for 11 months when it happened. I had an e-mail from him in my inbox once I reached a computer ashore.

I guess we where hoping that nothing had changed at home. Somebody might have gotten married; somebody had a kid, yes. But this we hadn‘t expected. Something big had changed. Something big was missing. And we had changed. This event had definitely triggered a larger change. In all four of us. Would you be happy with the life you were living if you died tomorrow?

© Ole Brodersen
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What else happens to you, when you sit under the stars for four hours every night? When the weather has full power over you. It controls where you are going. How fast you are going to get there. What you are wearing. Moving so slowly that you, sometimes, even move backwards with the current. You can adjust your sails of course, but in the end, the weather has the final word. It never made me believe in faith or anything though. That what you do doesn‘t matter. On the contrary actually, I feel empowered. Because I now know of a situation that is totally opposite of the life I am living on land.

© Ole Brodersen
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I flew from Cuba to NYC. I needed vacation. It might sound weird, but yes, I did. First of all the boat isn‘t big, there are no doors, and what probably bothered me the most was the lack of freedom. Any decision, no matter size, had to be discussed by the four of us. Where we were going, how long we were staying there, who our guests should be and so forth. Even leaving the boat, if we were on anchor, would have to be done together with somebody. Thus, in New York, it became very clear to me what I liked and disliked about this trip. And I simply loved the freedom I had in NYC. I had a flat I could enter and leave as I pleased. I had a cell phone, which finally made my appointments easier to make and change. And it was only me, myself and I. There were almost no limitations.

© Ole Brodersen
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The adaptation to a more civilized life in NYC went very smooth, of course because I had missed it, but also because it was temporary. I knew I was getting back on the boat. I didn‘t like the thought of it in the beginning, but at the end of my stay I was ready for, and even missed the life on the boat.

© Ole Brodersen
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The trickier part was getting used to life back home. One year without conventional work, one year with having the opportunity to read eight hours a day, one year with not knowing what tomorrow will be like. The longer we‘d been sailing, the harder I believe it would‘ve been to get back.

© Ole Brodersen
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As I mentioned, I feel I learn about myself through my photographs. I seriously believe that my subconsciousness can tell me and explain things to me through the photos. And to put an end to this story I have included a photo I took after I had returned home. I took this on a road trip in Norway. I like the simple symbolism of the future and past being the same, and personally consider this photo as some kind of a proof of me being comfortable with the journey being over.

Please visit Ole Brodersen homepage.

© Ole Brodersen
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Text and photographies by David Paul Lyon.

Perhaps the most formative experience of my life, surpassed only by the birth of my son transpired at the impressionable age of fifteen while on a family visit to the Des Moines Art Center in Des Moines Iowa. It had been a rainy Saturday when my parents, sister and I had piled in the car and traveled into the city to take a look at the current exhibition of work by Chuck Close.

© David Paul Lyon
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Neither of my parents had a significant interest in the arts. My fatherʼs interests mostly revolved around outdoor activities like hunting and fishing and my mother spent her free time either garage sale hunting or shopping at the local mall. In hindsight it is clear to me that the visit revolved around the passionate interest that I had shown in art for the previous couple of years. Even at that early age I was committed to following a career as an artist. At that point however I was, as one can imagine still directionless and in the exploratory stages of even settling on a medium.

© David Paul Lyon
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After having taken a diligent look at the temporary exhibition of work by Chuck Close of which I had been duly impressed we entered the gallery of the permanent collection. Back behind the display of Jeff Koonsʼ “Hoover Vacuum Cleaner Double Decker” I saw the painting that for me changed everything. Francis Baconʼs “Study after Velazquezʼs Portrait of Pope Innocent X” hung in what I felt was a forgotten corner of the gallery. What I saw and felt in that moment was for me an epiphany.

Francis Bacon – Pope Innocent X
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Until that point, despite my passionate interest in art I had seen nothing more transformative than what was embodied in that work. The haunting ghost-like image of a screaming pope painted on an untreated canvas with obscuring streaks of paint stopped me dead in my tracks. Iʼm not sure how long I stood before that painting, but for me it felt as if time had stopped.

Velasquez – Innocent X
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The title of the piece was as well for me deliciously blasphemous. “Pope Innocent” struck me as the perfect left jab to the gut of the Vatican. Only years later did I find out that Diego Velezquez original painting was of the actual Pope Innocent X. The original portrait by Velezquez that the study by Bacon is of, now strikes me as even more sinister than the painting by Bacon. Pope Innocent X, painted by Velezquez, sneering from his papal throne in what was likely a more flattering portrait than how he actually looked is a chilling work of art. The irony of the title of Francis Bacon’s painting however, was not lost on me. This was still a couple of decades before the Catholic Church sex scandal emerged, but even at this young age and despite having the good fortune not to have been abused in any way by a member of the clergy, I nonetheless knew that something with the Catholic Church was amiss.

© David Paul Lyon
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To my fatherʼs dismay, at the age of about thirteen years old, two full years earlier, I vocally raised my doubts about the validity of the Catholic Church and Christianity as a whole. The hypocritical position the church as well as itʼs members took on exclusion based on a persons prior experiences, sexual orientation or cultural background as well as the church members own hypocritical actions outside of that brief moment when Mass was being held, struck me as a complete dismissal of the human values Jesus Christ taught nearly every time the Scripture was cited.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

In the attempt to get me to change my mind my parents sought the help of the Monsignor who oversaw our parish. Monsignor Schwarte was an extremely intelligent and well traveled man who had been a missionary in Africa for several years whom I respected immensely. Through our discussions about his travels and experiences, myself citing the inevitable fact that there are so many people from so many different cultures around the globe, that to have all of them to subscribe to Christianity is a futile effort and the churches position that those who follow any other doctrine are doomed to eternal damnation was a direct contradiction to what I felt a humane and just God would allow. Over the course of several weeks and many extensive discussions with Monsignor Schwarte and contrary to what my parents had hoped for, my position against the church as well as exceptionalism of any kind at this time became permanently galvanized.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

Soon after having seen “Study after Velazquezʼs Portrait of Pope Innocent X”, since these were still the days before the internet became a part of our daily lives, I attempted to research the work of Francis Bacon in both our school and public library but yielded no results. Many years later when I was in my early twenties I chanced upon an exhibition of his work at the MOMA on a visit to New York City. Besides being struck by the consistent intensity of his paintings what surprised me the most was what the artist said regarding that series of pope paintings which was that it was “an excuse to use these colors, and you canʼt give ordinary clothes that purple color without getting into a sort of false fauve manner.” Francis Bacon, who also surprisingly resembled Mickey Rooney more than the dark angel I had always imagined him to be, said this in my opinion to be perceived as nonchalant and to avoid attempting an earnest explanation of his actual motivations.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

In the subsequent years following the experience of seeing this, for me formative work of art and as the memory faded from itʼs immediate vibrancy, I chose photography as my artistic medium and subscribed myself to the doctrine called straight photography endorsed by another significant influence, Edward Weston. After finishing high school I enrolled at the Art Institute of Boston and passionately studied the Zone System, developed by Ansel Adams and learned the basics of the archival printing process. When I had reached the point where I felt I had a solid knowledge of the medium of photography and after having seen the early work of Mike and Doug Starn, I left the Art Institute because I felt the funds I would need for tuition would be better spent creating a significant body of work.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

In the following years I created a technique using Polaroid film that was deliberately unconventional. I continued to enroll sporadically in photography courses during that time but since the general faculty reaction to my efforts were between cool and dismissive I ceased to seek their approval and rather made a radical attempt to distance my work from what their perception of art photography was.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

Within a few years, after having attempted to live in Barcelona, Spain I found myself living in Munich, Germany. During the eleven years that I lived there being represented first by Cynthia Close formerly of Artworks¹ and subsequently by Brigitte Woischnik formerly of Foto Factory², I achieved moderate success as an artist as well as a commercial photographer making photographs commercially for magazines and advertising agencies as well as exhibiting my photographs and selling them to private collectors. The photographs that I sold to collectors were Cibachrome reproductions, mounted on aluminum plates and coated with Auto lacquer of the polaroids that I made regularly. Despite being unconventional in process and very well executed as well as beautiful, they were however universally accessible and in retrospect, generally unchallenging.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

I had another epiphanic moment during this time after having delivered a commissioned series of prints to a private collector in Mannheim. She informed me that she was withholding payment of the series, which was for me a significant amount of money, because there were a few small blemishes in the auto lacquer on a couple of the prints. These blemishes were tiny and only visible in direct reflection of a light source. After having traveled to Mannheim in frustration to remedy the blemishes, on my return to Munich I decided to embark on creating a process that, rather than trying to create a mirror like print of an imaginary world, would be instead its own object with scars and blemishes an integral part of itʼs own aesthetic.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

As fortune has it, about the time that I was closing in on a new process I had the opportunity to present my work and early attempts at this process to Rolf Müller who produced a magazine at the time for Heidelberg Press called HQ³. This magazine focused on a particular theme and featured photographs revolving around this theme. The particular theme he was seeking work for was “Reste” or “Leftovers”. Having recently been shown a book on the subject of the Mummies of Palermo by a friend, I expressed my wish to travel to Palermo Sicily, photograph the mummies and produce a series for HQ with my newly developed process. To my astonishment, he without hesitation agreed.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

When, after exhaustive preparation, I finally entered the door to the catacomb a Capuchin monk solicited a donation to the monastery which I duly paid. Although photographing in the catacomb was permitted, I felt the unspoken expectation that it was to be minimal and worked while I was there as quietly and imperceptibly as possible. Arriving as soon as the catacomb opened in the morning I would take advantage of the first couple of hours before the rush of tourists would arrive. After three mornings of photographing it was made clear to me by the monks that I was no longer welcome regardless of how generous my donation was or how many postcards I bought. My work there however was complete. Rather than focusing of the impressive mass of the couple of thousand mummies on display, which had primarily been how I had seen the catacomb represented, I instead, had concentrated on them individually and attempted to make as intimate of a portrait as possible of each mummy I photographed. After returning to Munich with my film, developing and contact printing it, I needed several weeks to completely digest what I had made. Magazine publishing not being conducive to artistic digestion made it necessary for me to produce the first few prints that were published in HQ in 1995.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

Unsatisfied with the initial prints published in HQ which I nonetheless stood by and still consider to be of the standard represented by a magazine whoʼs initials stand for high quality, I then took the process even further by working in larger scale on the prints, employing as well for the largest of the prints canvas embedded with photographic emulsion. What changed for me at that time was the approach I took toward handling the photographic material. By freeing myself from the confines of concerning myself with dust on the negatives, perfect rectangles and blemishes of the surface of the prints I focused my attention entirely on the overall aesthetic and impact of the print. I no longer tried to dry the prints so they would be entirely flat or worried that my fingerprints would appear on the surface. Through exhaustive experimentation with various combinations of toners I finally found the processes that would do justice to those negatives.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

After having completed the “Mummies of Palermo” print series I was entirely changed. I began applying the approach I had taken to all of the photographs that I made. I remember a conversation with Jörg Badura, a photographer who was also represented by Foto Factory at the time warn me that by taking this radically different approach to my work I ran the serious risk of alienating my present clientele. As a business decision he was entirely correct. The commercial work I made at that time began to diminish and the handful of private collectors who supported my work waned in interest. Even Brigitte Woischnik, owner of Foto Factory, who had been a avid supporter of my work thus far began referring to me as her “special” photographer meaning, I believe, unpredictable. She among others found that they could no longer relate to my work. Even Daniel Blau, who runs an art gallery in Munich, son of Georg Baselitz, in explaining why he was reluctant to exhibit my work declared “People donʼt buy photographs of dead children!” It was at this point that I was entirely sure that I was on to something.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

In the following years the commercial photographic projects I was commissioned became largely tormenting since, with the exception of a small handful of clients, namely Dagmar Murkudis of Marie Claire Magazine who granted me full creative license with every project I created for her, I was expected to produce photographs that were against my very core principles of aesthetic and content. Not only could I not relate to the products I was photographing, I was becoming increasingly embarrassed that I was producing these photographs. I decided then that I should move to Paris to find a more receptive audience than what Munich had to offer.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

After living in Paris for nearly a year and enjoying moderate commercial success producing photographs that I stood entirely behind, with the help of Dominique Veret, a committed advocate of my work and close personal friend, I was introduced to then stylist Charlotte Flossaut and found myself photographing a collection of clothes designed by Jeremy Scott, a conceptual fashion designer. Upon realizing that he had intentionally designed clothes for anorexic models that a normal thin girl could not even fit into, I entirely lost my stomach for commercial photography of any kind. Soon thereafter I returned to Munich and decided to support myself by other means than commercial photography.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

In the years since this time, having moved back to the United States my work has developed immensely. Freed of the expectation of commercial photographic production I now enjoy the possibility of completely digesting the content of my work before printing it and making no provisions whatsoever toward itʼs commercial viability. I photograph what I am earnestly drawn to, whether its a small object, a person or a landscape and am confident that my approach to my work is unique and entirely, unashamedly honest. I remain exceptionally proud of my artistic accomplishments on the whole. The experience I gained by living and working in Europe for so many years and having worked for the several fine publications that have featured my work during this time has given me the confidence to turn my back entirely on commercial photography and focus my creative attention exclusively on producing the work that moves me most. I strive to create work that has a timeless impact and will hopefully remain touching to the viewer for many eras to come and not be “old news” as soon as the next issue of a magazine is released.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

My work, at its best, I see as a reflection of the viewer. Similar to a Rorschach test, I believe that the viewer makes their own associations with what they see in my work, especially in the abstract prints and extracts from it what stirs just below the surface of their own personal consciousness. Although my work is conceptual in nature, I still feel that it doesnʼt dismiss the visceral experience of the individual viewers own personal associations and emotions. If I havenʼt yet achieved the goal of producing the impact on the viewer that I felt decades ago in front of Francis Baconʼs “Study after Velazquezʼs Portrait of Pope Innocent X”, I nonetheless feel that Iʼm well on my way.

Please visit David Paul Lyon website.

© David Paul Lyon
Please visit Innocent X, by David Paul Lyon for the full size image.

1. ARTWORKS is now defunct and Cynthia Close is currently the executive director for Documentary Educational Resources that focuses on promoting independent documentary films.
2. Foto Factory closed their doors over a decade ago and Brigitte Woischnik is now a freelance literary editor for books mainly regarding the history of fashion. Most recently for a book about Lillian Bassman & Paul Himmel.
3. HQ Magazine was a project run by Buro Rolf Müller for Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG from 1985 until 1998 and hasn’t got much web presence but is known and regarded amongst the German design circles. The principle designer for that project was Mark Holt.

Photos by Muge (木格), text by Louise Clements. ¹

their melancholy
is also my melancholy.
my melancholy is also theirs

I first became aware of Muge on Flickr.com when I was searching for artists to visit in 2008 during a research trip to Chongqing China, with colleagues from QUAD. I wanted to find someone that would be under the radar of the main institutions that were facilitating our visit. I wanted to meet someone real, on the ground and working on their own terms, outside of the commercial art and international biennale circuits – someone of the underground so to speak. ‘To be a great artist you must not be afraid to be hungry’ Muge from Chengdu and his friends from all over Schezuan province are just this, they have committed to great hardship, taken the risk to believe in themselves enough to become photographers in a place where opportunities are scarce, competition is high, materialism is fashionable and individualism is a treacherous endeavor.

© Muge (木格)
Please visit About Muge photography, by Louise Clements for the full size image.

Fortunately as a consequence of our encounter on flickr and then in Chongqing I was able to invite Muge to the UK to participate in Format International Photography Festival – Photocinema, in the title exhibition with his work Silence and in person with fellow photographer from Chongqing, Zhang Xiao. I was fascinated how they would view the UK, during their first trip outside of China, and indeed they applied a similar principle and unique viewpoint to representing the places they encountered. For Muge his photographs often toy with the cinematic/filmic in ways that allow him to expand into imagined sequence the tension of which the before and the after offer a temporal dimension in the mind of the viewer, a place where the narrative of the onlooker is vitalized. Parallels can be drawn between Muge in relation to the influence of film Director Jia Zhangke and photographers Walker Evans, Robert Frank, Martin Parr and August Sander. Most clearly perhaps in the kinds of subjects he focuses on that mirrors Sanders series People of the 20th Century. In this Sander aims to show a cross-section of society during the Weimar Republic. The series is divided into seven sections: Farmers, Skilled Tradesman, Women, Classes and Professions, Artists, City, and The Last People (homeless people, veterans and so on). By 1945 Sander’s archive included over 40,000 images. Muge is part way there already.

© Muge (木格)
Please visit About Muge photography, by Louise Clements for the full size image.

Muge’s recent works titled Silence and Go Home are perhaps the most autobiographical series. Muge has a unique point of view, different from the hundreds of western photographers who have tried to represent the region. He drifts through the city and country side mapping people and place, he can relate directly to the dislocated people of the Three Gorges region along the banks of the Yangtze River, because it is where he has lived all his life. Chinese people respond differently to a westerner with a camera, Muge can pass unnoticed or at least his presence does not cause a local reaction. He is able to look people in the eye on literally level terms, in so many ways he is part of the people he represents.

© Muge (木格)
Please visit About Muge photography, by Louise Clements for the full size image.

The notion of home throughout Muge’s work takes the idea of home as something that is the starting point of life it is a refuge, it is the last place that would shut you out, it is the romanticized sanctuary of belonging.

…the desire to return home becomes much stronger, just like a dream enchanting the mind every night. Only by returning home can that lukewarm sense of loss be eliminated.²

© Muge (木格)
Please visit About Muge photography, by Louise Clements for the full size image.

Thousands of people from China each year migrate to the cities and beyond to find work but as the Chinese saying goes – even leaves return to their roots. What can you do if your home has been submerged and your family, culture and community fractured and relocated? Where do you go, when even the geography has changed? Two extremes seem to emerge in Muge’s images of deep sorrow and that of numbness.

© Muge (木格)
Please visit About Muge photography, by Louise Clements for the full size image.

Some may say that Muge’s images are filled with Saudade a German word meaning filled with longing, and in my understanding of it – for home and nostalgia for lost dreams. But I also believe them to be beyond longing reflecting the rapid changes in China as felt by the people. Representing the individuals swept along and those left behind literally by the tidal wave of progress from the Three Gorges Dam project and economic developments – the utopian future in spite of the present. Photography becomes a tool to turn memories into something tangible an attempt of remembrance, to keep one’s memories intact. The changes for many have been too hard to bear, longing turns to numbness where there is regret in that we no longer know what we long for, and if we ever did. In the words of Pink Floyd:

There is no pain, you are receding.
A distant ships smoke on the horizon.
You are only coming through in waves.
Your lips move but I can’t hear what you’re saying.
When I was a child I caught a fleeting glimpse,
Out of the corner of my eye.
I turned to look but it was gone.
I cannot put my finger on it now.
The child is grown, the dream is gone.
I have become comfortably numb.³

© Muge (木格)
Please visit About Muge photography, by Louise Clements for the full size image.

He has an obsession with people and the vernacular, people and place. His are contradictory emotive pictures full of emotion and latent motive and they are truly wonder-full in their numbness. They are meaning rich and in looking at them, spending time with them you cannot help to feel that part of your memory has been etched with the people and places as seen through Muge’s eyes, that then become your own. Despite acknowledging the contradiction between the recorded image and the inaccuracies of human visual memory our dislocated biographies cannot help but become connected for a moment.

© Muge (木格)
Please visit About Muge photography, by Louise Clements for the full size image.

Within his photography lies a desire crystallised by the word ‘regarder’ a dynamic coupling of the act of looking (regard) holding in your mind and eyes; and preserving (garder) documenting and evidencing. This perfectly summarises the intent in the photographs. Muge’s images both preserve and reflect, poetic moments in time and in memory of the world that he inhabits. He wants the memories of his images to endure. Numbed and unconscious of the camera, recording pain and indifference for posterity the memory of those moments will have to cling to the pictures that remain. They are also an honest reflection of his unique view of his homeland, he has a special eye for the sublime and melancholic of the lost – perhaps a reflection of his own soul.. however to meet him you will understand that he, luckily, naturally prioritises joyfulness over sorrow. Muge has refined his technique to represent a sense of place that is greater and more compacted than the geography of everyday life, it is a transformative world beyond the facade. Dostoyevsky was known to have said that ‘Beauty will save the world’. To this end these images come from a desire not only to elucidate the incredible but also from an ambition to examine and find the transcendent, rather than represent the beauty of mere surfaces.

© Muge (木格)
Please visit About Muge photography, by Louise Clements for the full size image.

© Muge (木格)
Please visit About Muge photography, by Louise Clements for the full size image.

1. Louise Clements is a curator, writer, performer and artist. Currently Senior Curator of QUAD also Co-founder and Curator of Format International Photography Festival Biennale, Derby UK.
2. See Confucius institute online.
3. Comfortably numb by Pink Floyd, 1979.

Text and photos by Suzanne Révy.

From time to time, it’s important for photographers (and other artists, I suspect), to think about their motivation and circumstances behind the medium we choose, and the work we make. I have long loved making pictures, but floundered to find my photographic voice when I was in my twenties and thirties. In recent years, however, as I mastered greater control over black and white film processing and printing, I turned the lens toward family and children, and have, at last found that voice. As a result of these photographic efforts, I have become keenly aware of how my children interact with and explore the world around them, whether in the back yard or on a far flung family trip. In photographing the small events and details of the life of our household, I have come to the inescapable conclusion that the most satisfying photographs for me bestow a kind of significance and importance to even the most ordinary of lives. I have, over the past several years, wanted to make pictures that are not only about my own family or my own children, but that can be seen and perceived as being about many children and families—to find some common truths. With all that in mind, I thought it would be fun to recall, and commit to paper the circumstances that led to the evening when I made my picture, Evolution.

Swim Lesson
© Suzanne Révy
Please visit Evolution – On Making a Picture, by Suzanne Révy for the full size image.

Two years ago I flew with my husband and two boys, Eric and Adam, to Los Angeles, the starting point for a grand road trip to see cousins, to visit tourist attractions and (for me) to make pictures in California. After a few days in L.A., we hit the road bound for Bass Lake just south of Yosemite. The journey there was a long one– up over the grapevine into Bakersfield and through the lush central valley. We arrived to find ourselves on a spectacular lake of shimmering shores and jade colored warm water. With so many coves to explore, and places to swim, fish or boat, it was difficult to wrangle willing participants to make the pictures I was seeing in my mind. Sadly, our stay felt woefully short, and though I photographed quite a bit, I was unsure if I had any keepers among the pictures I had made while we were there.

Spout
© Suzanne Révy
Please visit Evolution – On Making a Picture, by Suzanne Révy for the full size image.

Our next stop was the Bay area. The long winding one-lane roads that snaked through the golden hills north of Fresno took us through some gorgeous farmland, but the ride was punctuated by the whining complaints of the kids growing weary of the car. Once there, we spent time with my husband’s family, and saw the sites of San Francisco. I found, however, the urban environment uninteresting to me visually, and to my surprise, the bright sun over San Francisco was a little harsh. In the end, feeling a little discouraged, I decided to enjoy our tourist time, and the company without the worry of making very many pictures. We headed back to L.A. for a final seemingly, endless ride in the cramped rental car for our concluding two days on the west coast. Two days, much to my relief, with little planned.

Steady ahead
© Suzanne Révy
Please visit Evolution – On Making a Picture, by Suzanne Révy for the full size image.

On the last evening of our trip, we got together with my brother’s and sister’s families with all the ingredients that make for a good time — a house full of kids, a warm night, a swimming pool, and my brother-in-law’s legendary ribs. As often happens at such times, the children banded together while the adults gathered into their own playgroup of sorts. I glanced over at the pool; the kids were climbing out of the water, walking on the wall along the back of the pool, and jumping back in. They were bathed in that diffused late afternoon light of Los Angeles. Knowing that only a few feet away there were pictures to be made, I couldn’t possibly enjoy the grown up banter at that moment, so I loaded up the camera and started to snap away.

Running in Corn
© Suzanne Révy
Please visit Evolution – On Making a Picture, by Suzanne Révy for the full size image.

The kids weren’t particularly conscious of the camera and paid attention to me only when they wanted me to resolve one or two conflicts that arose between them (happily, nothing so major that they gave up their game). At some point, I saw half of Kimmy leave the frame as Ginger began to lift herself up. I honestly didn’t see what Adam and Max were doing, but in my peripheral vision I caught a glimpse of Eric just outside the frame. In the next frame Eric appears, and Kimmy has vanished into the water. And so the game went on for a good long while, and I was excited by what I saw.

Three rolls of film later, the sun had set, the light had become low and flat, and the ribs were ready. As we sat down to eat dinner and enjoy a glass of wine, I thought, “At last. Now I know I’ve made a good picture on this trip.” And my earlier frustrations seemed to disappear with that knowledge.

Stretched
© Suzanne Révy
Please visit Evolution – On Making a Picture, by Suzanne Révy for the full size image.

When I reviewed the film some weeks later, both my husband and a good friend were struck by this particular frame’s similarity to the Evolution of Man graphic that is so familiar. The human eye and the camera lens see so differently. My observations (and indeed our whole trip) had been disjointed, but the camera records everything in its field of view, and by revealing the details so easily missed, it can give certain pictures a deeper meaning. The kids’ game did not bring to mind the evolution of man as I watched and exposed the film, but the picture does. And for me it brings to my mind just how much each of them has grown and evolved as individuals. It is at once a record of a simple moment of play, a record of a family vacation, but it carries a meaning beyond the particulars of the event recorded. This dichotomy, this tension between the personal and the universal are the essence of a good photograph.

Oh, and by the way… I was happy to find the frame I call “Fool’s Gold” among the ones made at Bass Lake, named for the gold flecked sand found in the beaches there.

Fool's Gold
Please visit Evolution – On Making a Picture, by Suzanne Révy for the full size image.

In this article Miyuki Okuyama, in addition to telling her childhood in a small village in northern Japan, explains her personal vision of photography. For Miyuki Okuyama, instead of documenting some kind of tangible reality, photography provides an access to a parallel world in which we can lose ourselves in our dreams and fantasies.

“Safe Playgroud”, the series of photos described in the essay, is entirely built and staged at home, (in a certain way like the dark worlds by Hyeyoung Kim, but in a much more realistic style), creating beautiful mysterious micro-worlds, explicitly in contrast to the accurate organization of Netherlands, the country where Miyuki Okuyama lives today.

Following text and photos by Miyuki Okuyama.

© Miyuki Okuyama

Contrary to the generally accepted purpose of photography, that is to record the present reality, my photographs are created in order to express rather inner, invisible reality. Actually a Japanese art director Shigeo Goto described my images “psycho-grapy.” One of my photo series titled “Safe Playground” is staged photography, and they are created aiming at triggering psychological effect in a viewer’s mind, such as childish fear, anxiety, and vague nightmares etc. These photographs trace the vestiges of memories which submerged in our sub-consciousness.

It is more important for me how something appears in the image than what it really is. That is the way I often create anonymous places or peripheral corners of an ordinary city in the images. My attempt is to summon previously mentioned feeling like fear and anxiety, and collective memory. One manner of this attempt is to make images somewhat familiar to anyone. Old hospital building, a signal box standing on railway, a roadside motel sign, a lit circus tent are all rather insignificant subjects which anyone may have seen somewhere, sometime.

© Miyuki Okuyama

As I wrote, my images are more of psychological representation than the representation of tangible reality. My ambition is to create images of a parallel world in which to lose ourselves in our own thoughts, fantasies, fears, dreams and memories. For the photo series “Safe Playground,” inspiration comes from my own memories, irrational childhood dreams and fears as well as fantasies. I spend my childhood and youth in a small village in northeast Japan. For me, this was a magical and somehow haunted place, just as the photo serried “Kamaitachi” by a Japanese photographer Eikoh Hosoe. In the works of Hosoe, one sees a strange panorama of an imaginary village, richly filled with references to old tales and superstitious, odd characters, who remind me of a man called Tadashi, a man with mild retardation in my neighborhood. Also a Japanese film and theater maker (also a poet and writer) Shuji Terayama created many of his writing and films (“Death in the Country” for instance) based on his childhood and youth in a small town in Aomori region. Both Hosoe and Terayama are from Tohoku region (northeast) of Japan as I am.

© Miyuki Okuyama

I do not know how exactly to explain, but my region has both charm and horror of a remote area. There is one good example of what it was like there: As a child, I was raised in a traditional farm household, where four generations lived under one roof. Not only my mother, but also my grandmother and my great-grandmother took care of me and my younger sister. I still remember my great-grandmother singing in old dialect lullabies. She said, “go to sleep child before the one-eyed demon comes to you. He’s standing already under our neighbor’s eaves.” This is one of the memories with dark undertone which are also fascinating.

© Miyuki Okuyama

In “Safe Playground,” the images are predominated by darkness, which is symbolically associated with human subconscious, and as the title “safe playground” literally tells that the images are the places to temporally relief human emotions (fear, anxiety, of course) in its suspended disbelief. For this reason, my works may have resemblance to the famous tales like “Little Red Riding Hood.” The tale provided readers a place to experience danger (particularly to young girls) and even enjoy it in safety. The author Charles Perraut concluded the tale:

“Moral: children, especially attractive, well bred young ladies, should never talk to strangers, for if they should do, they may well provide dinner for a wolf. I say “wolf,” but there are various kinds of wolves. There are also those who are charming, quiet, polite, unassuming, complacent, and sweet, who pursue young women at home and in the street. And unfortunately, it is these gentle wolves who are the most dangerous one of all.”

© Miyuki Okuyama

As Perraut suggests the danger of a “wolf,” my photos also may remind a viewer of figures like a kidnapper, a false prophet, Bluebeard etc. These “archetype” of modern day are invisible yet are suggested in those images. In his famous novel “Lolita,” Vladimir Nabokov wrote, “My Chère Dolores! I want to protect you, dear, from all the horrors that happen to little girls in coal sheds and alley ways, and alas, comme vous le saves trop bien, ma gentille, in the blueberry woods during the bluest of summers.” (Vintage International, New York, 1955) These “coal sheds” or “alley ways” are exactly what a viewer sees in “Safe Playground.”

The series “Safe Playground,” besides subconscious fear as its central subject, has been motivated by the way contemporary society is structured. I started this series after I came to the Netherlands. I was devastated by the fact that I cannot find places to take photographs. This country is thoroughly too well organized. Then I have decided to make up interesting places myself. These images are all created in my studio, on my worktable, to be precise. Being in a different culture motivated me to do all these troubles of photographing (constructing the models, setting the scenes, shooting and more re-shooting).

© Miyuki Okuyama

Where I grew up, as I have already mentioned, is a small conservative country village. Compare to such backcountry, my new home seemed overly organized and urbanized. Despite its modernity, it seems something is missing, perhaps, shadows and ambiguity, and definitely the autonomy of individual spaces. In the Netherlands, everything must be controlled; new suburban town with straight and square city plan, streets are brightly lit at night, and even the trees in groves are lined geometrically. While the farmers of my home are free to build sheds with reused materials, Netherlanders have no such freedom. In this country, monstrous civilization is exterminating shady places. After coming to the Netherlands, I have come to realize how important to have ambiguous places near me, where human feelings can be freed.

“Psycho-graphy” may be macabre and ominous, yet it can also be intriguing and evocative. It is obviously different from “photography,” for it represents the alternative reality instead of the reality that surrounds us. Despite the darkness in the images, they look strangely familiar and tender, because we all posses such darkness within. My photographs reveal such simple fact that we all have dusky depth filled with long-discarded fears in our minds.

Jack Radcliffe for years photographs in black and white the members of his family and his friends, gradually creating several series of photos that explore the long term evolution of the photographer relationship with his friends and relatives.

Here a selection of his works with an introduction to the subjects portrayed in each series and a description of the photographs he shoot at the York House Hospice in York, PA.

Following text and images by Jack Radcliffe.

Introduction

Alison
© Jack Radcliffe

I have been making portraits of family, friends and acquaintances for the past 35 years. Early in my career, I discovered that the meaning of a single exposure, when it is part of a collection of moments, becomes only one element of an evolving story. Since the addition of each new portrait changes the meaning of the entire sequence, each image is no longer static. In every succeeding photograph, the subject and I are older, our circumstances have changed, and our relationship has deepened or dissolved. All of these forces are reflected in my photographs.

I am not a passive chronicler or documentary photographer. Whether the subject is my daughter, a local family, a former student, or a hospice patient, they are all in part autobiographical.

Dan

Dan & Selena
© Jack Radcliffe

Daniel Van Allen, Selena and Spoon are at the center of Baltimore’s art underground. Dan lives in Sowebo (Southwest Baltimore), where he has connected two row houses creating a rabbit warren of a dwelling. His house is packed with such disparate artifacts as found objects, animal skeletons, coconut heads, and other objects from his trips to India and Mexico. All of these objects become a unified art installation which he calls Visionary Environment. His pet chicken, Chick-a-pea, lives in Daniel’s five connected backyards.

Hospice

Hospice
© Jack Radcliffe

As I photographed Barnie, I felt like such an intruder. I had to repeat myself, “These people want me to document this”.

I had mixed feelings when I was asked to participate in this project. I’m always excited about new opportunities, but I wasn’t sure how or if this fit into my work. When I began, I wasn’t really sure what hospice was. I only knew that it had to do with death. One of my students was a nurse. When I asked her about hospice, she put me in touch with Joy Ufema, founder of the York House Hospice in York, PA. I sent a letter to Joy and when she invited me to photograph at the hospice, I was extremely apprehensive. However, at this time in my life it was fortuitous. My mother had just died, and my father was dying. I wasn’t dealing at all with my loss. Being with Joy and the nurses at York House -seeing their devotion to patients, both physically and spiritually- helped me to view death as a part of life. It was a cathartic transformation for me, and eventually I was able to grieve for my parents as well as the patients I came to know.

Carole Jean
© Jack Radcliffe

In my previous work I was always striving for intimacy. In a way, this project forced me to achieve a new level of intimacy. At York House, I photographed over and over in the same three rooms. I wanted to reveal the relationship of my subjects to their environment. Soon I had to find new visual solutions to this problem. I changed my perspective and moved in closer to the patients. The relationship in turn has transformed my photographs.

“Although Jack Radcliffe’s pictures have a look of inevitability, as though they had composed themselves, in fact they are authoritatively crafted. Part of his technique relies on an insistent monumentality of composition, combined with a strong linear drive. His lens reaches right up into the gesture. Mass works in counterpoint with contour.

Beppi
© Jack Radcliffe

For instance, in each image of the handsome, long-limbed Sheila, the angles of her body and the objects around her, the strong diagonals and curves of each outline in the picture, build a structure emphasizing the key visual element of her and of the picture – her huge, expressive eyes. As we analyze each image, we discover that each employs this same principle of locating some very particular feature – whether a way of posing the arms or body, or a distinctive droop of the jaw – and intuitively presents that feature through artfully empathic, rather than psychologically confrontational, means”.

From Hospice: A Photographic Inquiry. Edited by Phillip Brookman, Jane Livingston and Dena Andre, copyright © 1996. A Bullfinch Press Book. Published by Little, Brown and Company: Boston, New York, Toronto, and London. In Association with the Corcoran Gallery of Art and the National Hospice Foundation.

Alison

Alison
© Jack Radcliffe

My photographs of Alison, because of the nature of our relationship, are very much a father-daughter collaboration, Alison permitting me access to private moments of our life, which might, under different circumstances, be off-limits to a parent. The camera, early in her life, became part of our relationship, necessitating in me an acceptance, quietness. We’ve never had long photographic sessions, but rather moments alone or with friends.

Beppi

I began photographing Beppi and Stephen in 1992. They met while Beppi was in college studying art, married shortly after she graduated, and have since had three children, Gunnar, Ivana, and Strom. Beppi and Stephen share a passion for dress up. Beppi and Stephen admit they come from self-described dysfunctional families, which makes their strong marital bond, their desire for a large family, and the way they relate as husband and wife as well as mother and father, so compelling. Though unconventional in employment and pastimes, they have successfully built a traditional family structure.

Jen

Beppi
© Jack Radcliffe

I began a collaboration with Jenn with her daughter, Karma, in 2001. I was touched by the close bond between mother and daughter, and how they faced the challenges of single motherhood while living in subsidized housing.

In September of 2002, Jenn discovered that she was pregnant. We decided to celebrate the event by documenting every month throughout her pregnancy. I was honored to be the one man invited to attend the birth with ten women. Sage was born on June 26, 2003, at 6 p.m. I photographed the family regularly during Sage’s first year, culminating with her first birthday party.

Carole Jean

I first began photographing Carole Jean in the 1970s, when she lived in a primitive $35-a-month tenant farmhouse with her son and boyfriend. They were a self-sufficient household. There was an enormous vegetable garden for food, and they heated with wood. Carol Jean supported herself and her son, and without assistance from her family, earned an MFA.

Carole Jean lived the idyllic life of an artist; she painted, created mixed-media pieces, and photographed. Her paintings were colorful and fanciful, images inspired by her world travels, particularly to Oaxaca, Mexico. Her black and white and hand-colored photographs of elaborately costumed local children would have made Lewis Carroll envious.