Sunday, 7 February 2010
Tuesday, 26 January 2010
Another post from NID
Today I witnessed an amazing event, I was sitting with friends, reading a bit of "The Nature of Representation" by Richard Bernheimer (hoping for distraction)... when one of the 'NID puppies' that lives on the campus, dragged a giant bird of prey from the bushes, and dragged it into the open... suddenly the skies were alive with eagles, crows, all kinds of birds, circling... I managed to photograph 3 birds as they swooped down and came within inches of the dead bird, with the puppy standing its ground over it..
After the circling birds had given up, I managed to run and get my camera and borrowed Shiho Kito's very posh tripod (also, Shiho was kind enough to assist me, and was so helpful), I wanted one photo of the dog mauling on the bird, this was so hard, as I wanted the camera looking down at quite an extreme angle so that only grass could be seen and none of the surrounding bushes showed in the frame, but as soon as i move the tripod close to the dog and its lunch, it dragged the bird away... after about 4 attempts where I closed and cocked the shutter and loaded my darkslide, only to then have to remove it when the dog dragged the bird away - finally I got the shot, and then got another photo of the bird alone, quite close up... by this time another dog had arrived and they had ripped it in two quite neatly..
Yesterday, all of the UCA graduates and myself presented our work to the NID photography students, and the NID photography students presented their work to us. It was a fascinating day, they are an exceptionally talented bunch of photographers, and I have a feeling that I am witnessing the dawn of an explosion of exciting new photography coming from India.
Certainly the eyes of the world seem focused on India right now..
There was some exciting debate and some really refreshingly different work, I was amazed by the breadth of different work that is coming out of the course and intrigued by the differences in perceptions and styles between my own course in England and theirs in India...
hopefully more to come on this..
Cheers
After the circling birds had given up, I managed to run and get my camera and borrowed Shiho Kito's very posh tripod (also, Shiho was kind enough to assist me, and was so helpful), I wanted one photo of the dog mauling on the bird, this was so hard, as I wanted the camera looking down at quite an extreme angle so that only grass could be seen and none of the surrounding bushes showed in the frame, but as soon as i move the tripod close to the dog and its lunch, it dragged the bird away... after about 4 attempts where I closed and cocked the shutter and loaded my darkslide, only to then have to remove it when the dog dragged the bird away - finally I got the shot, and then got another photo of the bird alone, quite close up... by this time another dog had arrived and they had ripped it in two quite neatly..
Yesterday, all of the UCA graduates and myself presented our work to the NID photography students, and the NID photography students presented their work to us. It was a fascinating day, they are an exceptionally talented bunch of photographers, and I have a feeling that I am witnessing the dawn of an explosion of exciting new photography coming from India.
Certainly the eyes of the world seem focused on India right now..
There was some exciting debate and some really refreshingly different work, I was amazed by the breadth of different work that is coming out of the course and intrigued by the differences in perceptions and styles between my own course in England and theirs in India...
hopefully more to come on this..
Cheers
Saturday, 16 January 2010
Friday, 15 January 2010
Post two from India
I'm sorry if you follow my flickr and have already seen these photos, but I wanted to just recap on my last post.
I've now shot 13 sheets of film and today I feel more confident about my work than ever. I have taken many landscapes, but landscapes that I hope are little more intruiging, and many with some kind of life in (birds - dead and alive, or dogs or people), but all still very still... And i'm sure I'll be individually happy with each photograph, but I still had a worry with my series of photographs... how could all of these landscapes gel, and not to mention I have taken one portrait... but then I thought about Alec Soth's series 'Niagra', I know how everyone goes on about Niagra like it is the greatest piece of work for the past few years or something, so I feel quite silly talking about it... but you think about that work and how it includes landscapes, both 'natural' and unnatural, portraits lit by flash, natural lit portraits, still-lifes, photos of letters etc etc and you think how well it all gels.. I think its Soth's confidence as an author, to rest-assured that the viewer will pick up on these subtle 'Soth-like' traits of compositions. So yes, I feel silly for going on about Soth and Niagra, but thinking about it really gave me the confidence that I can make these photographs work together. I now just feel like I just need to be more assured, and not be afraid to move in and out, try different perspectives and not just keep that 'i'm using large format so i'm going to have loads of empty space and distance' aesthetic...
This has been a rather simple post, probably more for my benefit than yours..
sorry!
next post I hope to have just a few photos that I think need to be blogged.
This photo of me and my camera was taken just yesterday, on top of a rooftop in the Old City at Ahmedabad, getting photos of the kite festival. That was an amazing spectacle!
The bird in the photo above was obviosly killed after being caught up in one of the strings of a kite, the strings have tiny shards of glass threaded into them which no doubt does not help.
An estimated 1500 birds are killed over each kite festival in Ahmedabad..
Cheers
Saturday, 9 January 2010
Post no.70 coming to you from India
A Stray dog and a bit of an Antoine D'Agata moment... or whatever, I love the colours that the streetlights in India produce and I like the blur of colours in this photo.
Well, I'm here. Staying in Halls at the National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad.
The 10x8 made it to India safely, only once did I have to get it out and explain what it was, as soon as I unfolded it and it took on that familiar 'old camera' shape, the customs people at Dubai were asking me to take a picture...
Unfortunately I haven't had the time to load up my darkslides yet, this annoys me. But what can you do.
I took a few days to accustom myself to India, I didn't know it at the time but I think the first 2 days I was in a bit of a culture shock, on the third day I truly snapped out of this and suddenly I couldn't wait to get out wandering the streets an seeing images.
Unfortunately my one little problem right now is really visualising what images I want to create. I know I want to make quiet images, I know I want to make images with little or no people in, I know I want to make images with nature in, but also with signs of life... However I do not know why I want to do this or how and where. Anyone who's visited India will know that finding any kind of open space or anywhere at all with little or no people, is near impossible! For now, I'm content (maybe not so much 'content') but I'm okay to see if I can meet this challenge. I wish I knew why I wanted to capture India in this way.. that would help.
SO far I've observed that I really miss the lonliness of large expanses of space, and of quiet peaceful places where one is alone to think. Maybe I'm trying to create my own idyll in images in India.
I generally don't subscribe to such self-absorbed and internal concepts, so I shall have to meditate on this further.
In the meantime I'm taking part in NID's annual Open Elective (an opportunity for students to spend a week doing a course that is not their own) I'm taking part in Visual ambiguity, Paradoxes and Uncertainty in Representation and Exploration where I will be drawing and sculpting (this will be interesting). I chose this course as it theoretically appealed to me very much though, and after receiving a very interesting email accompanied by a poem from the man who is running the course, then I am eagerly looking forward to it.
I found a Hawk earlier, seemingly paralysed, but still concious.
Finding this is for the large part why I want to get the 10x8 loaded up and ready to shoot.
Hope all is well in snowy England and wherever you are.
From India; take care
Cheers
Monday, 4 January 2010
Myself (looking pretty stupid) and
my prints...
The leftmost image: 60x47"
The two others: 24x19"
They're hand-printed on Kodak Ultra-Endura Glossy from my 10x8" negatives.
Printed at Michael Dyer Associates.
These prints have never been through any digital process.
Mounted on 12mm MDF with black edges and a floating wall-mount.
Ideally all three photos would be the same size as the far-left photograph.
The text reads:
Vanitas
“To be immortal is commonplace; except for man, all creatures are immortal for they are ignorant of death; what is divine, terrible, incomprehensible, is to know one is mortal’
J.L.Borges
For this project I took on the role of the animal-gatherer, collecting dead animals off the roads and cycling home with them in my backpack to be stored in my freezer in my room, ready to be photographed later.
As time went on I dreaded and dreaded the moment when I would have to photograph the animals, slowly working myself into a panic.
A photograph is said to be a tiny piece of time that brutally and forever escapes its ordinary fate, some may even go as so far to say that a photograph immortalises a moment. Maybe my motivation for taking on such a project was to try and gain some control over time passing, life and death.
However when I finally stood in front of the dead animals, the moment I clicked the shutter I felt that I had not immortalized the moment, In that moment death was more present than ever.
Vanitas refers to a genre of art referencing the motif of the memento mori; reminding the viewer of the inevitability of death and the transience and vanity of earthly achievements and pleasures.
By Andrew Bruce
With thanks to James Gardiner (my assistant)
..............................................
Cheers
The leftmost image: 60x47"
The two others: 24x19"
They're hand-printed on Kodak Ultra-Endura Glossy from my 10x8" negatives.
Printed at Michael Dyer Associates.
These prints have never been through any digital process.
Mounted on 12mm MDF with black edges and a floating wall-mount.
Ideally all three photos would be the same size as the far-left photograph.
The text reads:
Vanitas
“To be immortal is commonplace; except for man, all creatures are immortal for they are ignorant of death; what is divine, terrible, incomprehensible, is to know one is mortal’
J.L.Borges
For this project I took on the role of the animal-gatherer, collecting dead animals off the roads and cycling home with them in my backpack to be stored in my freezer in my room, ready to be photographed later.
As time went on I dreaded and dreaded the moment when I would have to photograph the animals, slowly working myself into a panic.
A photograph is said to be a tiny piece of time that brutally and forever escapes its ordinary fate, some may even go as so far to say that a photograph immortalises a moment. Maybe my motivation for taking on such a project was to try and gain some control over time passing, life and death.
However when I finally stood in front of the dead animals, the moment I clicked the shutter I felt that I had not immortalized the moment, In that moment death was more present than ever.
Vanitas refers to a genre of art referencing the motif of the memento mori; reminding the viewer of the inevitability of death and the transience and vanity of earthly achievements and pleasures.
By Andrew Bruce
With thanks to James Gardiner (my assistant)
..............................................
Cheers
Happy New Year! (2009 - the year of failing technology)
First off, I'm writing this on my very own mac that is finally fixed! It was 5 blogs ago that it died, and its now been fitted with a brand new logic board and graphics card, all for free (apparently this would have set me back £750 if it hadn't been under warranty) phew!
While that is one thing that's fixed, my main zoom for my SLR is still a bit dead (well, it won't stop down), and just last week then my vertical-grip for the same camera decided that it was not going to let me remove my batteries.
I'm off to India tomorrow, stopping off at Dubai, so might catch a glimpse of this half-mile-high super tower...
As you might have guessed what with the shen-hao purchase, i've taken this as a good opportunity to update my kit a bit... And, so i've bought myself a compact camera.
For a while I've been looking out for a nice compact camera, for a log time I wasn't too sure whether to get a 35mm p&s (something like a Ricoh GR or Yashica T5), or a techy enthusiasts digital compact (like a G10/11 or a lumix DMC-LX3)...
I enjoy nothing much more than making images with a large format camera, but I do feel this urge to just snap every now and then, and make photos with a more flippant attitude.. not to mention I just want a camera that I can take with me everywhere..
This past Summer I spent my time running rolls of grainy black&white film through my manual 35mm Pentax SLR, in an attempt to get 'back to basics', and simplify my photographic process.. however I didn't really get on too well with this process and I think I wanted something a little more snappy, so I could really just point and shoot, no thought needed..
My questions were all answered when I saw the Canon S90, with the same sensor and processor as the Canon G11, but in a body about half the thickness.. The killer sale was that the S90 has two control wheels (one around the lens, like an aperture ring. And one thumb wheel like on my SLR). So far, i've been so impressed by the S90, the quality is lovely. Admittedly its nowhere near as good as an SLR, but this is just logic, and it's pretty damn good. If you want to now the technical details about this camera, visit KenRockwell.com. I've found the camera to be extremely flexible, i've been using it for quick photos on auto, but then when i'm picky and when the human eye knos that the meter is being stupid, then i've flicked it over to Aperture priority and set whatever aperture i like (using the ring around the lens!) and then (with auto ISO) set the exposure compensation with the thumb-wheel or locked the exposure and recomposed with the programmable 'S' button. This camera fits in my pocket so easily, and the ergonomics are perfect, as you can probably tell, I think this camera is perfect and I'm hugely happy with it.. all in all it's a bloody fun camera to use.
Canon S90 (ISO 80, f7.1, 1/400)
Happy New Year everyone, fingers crossed it's good one.
2009 will go down as the year of dramatic equipment failures!
Cheers
Monday, 28 December 2009
Portfolio issue 50
For the 50th issue of Portfolio magazine (marking 21 years of the publication), Portfolio invited 50 of the UK's most significant photographer/artists to contribute some of their newest work.
I thought this was a pretty bold stance and I found the choices and work in the issue pretty fascinating.
After the issue initially came out (which now I think of it, was quite a few weeks ago) I was expecting a succesion of blogs to suddenly come out an critique the choices and the state of photography in the UK etc... except I havn't seen any such blog entries!
SO while I won't do any critiquing, I thought I would atleast spread the word.. and any thoughts or critiquing is welcome...
The 50 artists chosen were:
Veronica Bailey, David Bate, Sian Bonnell, Victor Burgin, Gayle Chong Kwan, Calum Colvin, Thomas Joshua Cooper, Dalziel + Scullion, John Davies, Susan Derges, Anna Fox, Stuart Franklin, Peter Fraser, Ori Gersht, John Goto, Paul Graham, Brian Griffin, Anna Hardy, Tom Hunter, Max Kandhola, Kennardphillips (Peter Kennard), Idris Khan, Karen Knorr, Richard Learoyd, Chrystel Lebas, Yve Lomax, Rut Blees Luxemburg, Neeta Madahar, Mari Mahr, Melanie Manchot, Edgar Martins, Garry Fabian Miller, Martina Mullaney, Kevin Newark, Simon Norfolk, Sarah Pickering, Olivier Richon, Sophy Rickett, Michelle Sank, Helen Sear, Paul Seawright, Jem Southam, Hannah Starkey, Iain Stewart, Clare Strand, Mitra Tabrizian, Susan Trangmar, Bettina von Zwehl, David Williams, Catherine Yass.
I also particuklarly liked the closing paragraph of David Bate's introductory essay:
Art photography today, one might say, has become a constructive haven from the poplism of the mass media, not as a retreat from the social world, but as the place where image-work might be used to think about society, about what it means to be intimate, public, social, to see what it is like to have no visible history, to involve people or to treat subjectivity at its critical point. Against the incessant babble of celebrity culture with its shock and awe of nothingness, the role of art is ever more critical as the space to engage in serious play, in short to create a 'community of readers' that, as Jacques Ranciere puts it is 'a community without legitimacy'. That is to say, unlike the mass media world, whose images are largely closed to discussion in their presentation, art photography is increasingly the only open space left in which experience of the world is not pre-defined. It was precisely towards this openess to cultural experience that the Three Perceptives on Photography exhibition premised its entry into the art museam. The Three Perspectives, in short showed the capacity of photography to negotiate and engage with things in the world that really matter, thus also renewing the purpose of the art institution.
Cheers
I thought this was a pretty bold stance and I found the choices and work in the issue pretty fascinating.
After the issue initially came out (which now I think of it, was quite a few weeks ago) I was expecting a succesion of blogs to suddenly come out an critique the choices and the state of photography in the UK etc... except I havn't seen any such blog entries!
SO while I won't do any critiquing, I thought I would atleast spread the word.. and any thoughts or critiquing is welcome...
The 50 artists chosen were:
Veronica Bailey, David Bate, Sian Bonnell, Victor Burgin, Gayle Chong Kwan, Calum Colvin, Thomas Joshua Cooper, Dalziel + Scullion, John Davies, Susan Derges, Anna Fox, Stuart Franklin, Peter Fraser, Ori Gersht, John Goto, Paul Graham, Brian Griffin, Anna Hardy, Tom Hunter, Max Kandhola, Kennardphillips (Peter Kennard), Idris Khan, Karen Knorr, Richard Learoyd, Chrystel Lebas, Yve Lomax, Rut Blees Luxemburg, Neeta Madahar, Mari Mahr, Melanie Manchot, Edgar Martins, Garry Fabian Miller, Martina Mullaney, Kevin Newark, Simon Norfolk, Sarah Pickering, Olivier Richon, Sophy Rickett, Michelle Sank, Helen Sear, Paul Seawright, Jem Southam, Hannah Starkey, Iain Stewart, Clare Strand, Mitra Tabrizian, Susan Trangmar, Bettina von Zwehl, David Williams, Catherine Yass.
I also particuklarly liked the closing paragraph of David Bate's introductory essay:
Art photography today, one might say, has become a constructive haven from the poplism of the mass media, not as a retreat from the social world, but as the place where image-work might be used to think about society, about what it means to be intimate, public, social, to see what it is like to have no visible history, to involve people or to treat subjectivity at its critical point. Against the incessant babble of celebrity culture with its shock and awe of nothingness, the role of art is ever more critical as the space to engage in serious play, in short to create a 'community of readers' that, as Jacques Ranciere puts it is 'a community without legitimacy'. That is to say, unlike the mass media world, whose images are largely closed to discussion in their presentation, art photography is increasingly the only open space left in which experience of the world is not pre-defined. It was precisely towards this openess to cultural experience that the Three Perceptives on Photography exhibition premised its entry into the art museam. The Three Perspectives, in short showed the capacity of photography to negotiate and engage with things in the world that really matter, thus also renewing the purpose of the art institution.
(It seemed a shame to not have a picture in a post, so have a tree)
Cheers
Sunday, 27 December 2009
Merry Christmas
Okay, so I guess this is a little bit late, but in my defense, I am computer-less.. so blogging is hard. I'm finding even living without photoshop is hard (now thats the most pathetic statement i've ever heard) - just the simple things like small colour-tweaks or converting images to screen-res, and it's just bloody inconveniant.
But anyway, I hope everyone has had a superb Christmas and is having a hard-earned relaxing break.
I'm a sucker for trivia quizes and charades, and not to mention the terry's chocolate orange WITH popping candy is among the most awesome things ever..
The 'kind-of' white christmas this year was pretty wonderful also..
Anoyingly there have been so many images that I've wanted to blog recently (I always seem to find that when I leave Farnham i'm on a restless search for photos to make and take). Most awfully I still have not got any digital copies of the final images for my last series (as seen in the blog entry below- they were shot on film and then optically c-type printed - so never underwent any digital process) - I attempted to scan the contact sheets on my flatbed, but the results were so unsatisfactopry (though I think whatever I do, the results won't ever live up to the print quality on the beautiful super-glossy kodak ultra-endura paper)... Once I have the time I shall attempt scanning the negatives (this can kind of be done on my flatbed by scanning three little strips of each negative and then merging them) and then hopefully I can put these online and update the website (though, as ever, I'd love to re-do brucebruce.co.uk!)..
I suspect it shall be quite some time until I am able to get these things done, (though i'm sure I will get it all done eventually) as I am off to India for a month in January to stay at NID in Ahmedabad (listed by american magazine the Business Week as one of the best design schools in the world: http://images.businessweek.com/ss/07/10/1005_dschools/source/33.htm ) the trip is completely funded by a grant from the the Prime Ministers Initiative, so I'm feeling bloody excited...
I'm lucky enough to be taking this gorgeous camera with me.. So far I've only purchased black&white ilford FP4 film (some people have said i'm crazy for wanting to shoot mono in such a colourful place - any opinions on this are appreciated)
Sorry if I've got some pretty iffy spellings here, PC's are useless things that don't check your spelling!!
Cheers
But anyway, I hope everyone has had a superb Christmas and is having a hard-earned relaxing break.
I'm a sucker for trivia quizes and charades, and not to mention the terry's chocolate orange WITH popping candy is among the most awesome things ever..
The 'kind-of' white christmas this year was pretty wonderful also..
Anoyingly there have been so many images that I've wanted to blog recently (I always seem to find that when I leave Farnham i'm on a restless search for photos to make and take). Most awfully I still have not got any digital copies of the final images for my last series (as seen in the blog entry below- they were shot on film and then optically c-type printed - so never underwent any digital process) - I attempted to scan the contact sheets on my flatbed, but the results were so unsatisfactopry (though I think whatever I do, the results won't ever live up to the print quality on the beautiful super-glossy kodak ultra-endura paper)... Once I have the time I shall attempt scanning the negatives (this can kind of be done on my flatbed by scanning three little strips of each negative and then merging them) and then hopefully I can put these online and update the website (though, as ever, I'd love to re-do brucebruce.co.uk!)..
I suspect it shall be quite some time until I am able to get these things done, (though i'm sure I will get it all done eventually) as I am off to India for a month in January to stay at NID in Ahmedabad (listed by american magazine the Business Week as one of the best design schools in the world: http://images.businessweek.com/ss/07/10/1005_dschools/source/33.htm ) the trip is completely funded by a grant from the the Prime Ministers Initiative, so I'm feeling bloody excited...
I'm lucky enough to be taking this gorgeous camera with me.. So far I've only purchased black&white ilford FP4 film (some people have said i'm crazy for wanting to shoot mono in such a colourful place - any opinions on this are appreciated)
Sorry if I've got some pretty iffy spellings here, PC's are useless things that don't check your spelling!!
Cheers
Friday, 11 December 2009
Tuesday, 24 November 2009
Help
I had the pleasure of assisting Katie Bedlow on a shoot last week.
It was a lovely day (despite one brief spell of rain and a sprint for the shed) to be photographing allotments.
The 90mm super-angulon MC is such a nice lens, I'm very glad of that purchase.
(Photos by Katie and myself on a Yashica T3)
I've been shooting myself all this week and last week, and I have a session booked in with Michael Dyer associates on Monday to print, (so this will be my last week of shooting), I would be shooting tonight if it wasn't so windy!
Anyway, I've been lucky enough to be assisted by James Gardiner (who has been an indispensable help while I've been going so crazy) and who is no doubt the most skilled knot-tyer in difficult circumstances in the world) Check out his blog f.stops all the way
Cheers
It was a lovely day (despite one brief spell of rain and a sprint for the shed) to be photographing allotments.
The 90mm super-angulon MC is such a nice lens, I'm very glad of that purchase.
(Photos by Katie and myself on a Yashica T3)
I've been shooting myself all this week and last week, and I have a session booked in with Michael Dyer associates on Monday to print, (so this will be my last week of shooting), I would be shooting tonight if it wasn't so windy!
Anyway, I've been lucky enough to be assisted by James Gardiner (who has been an indispensable help while I've been going so crazy) and who is no doubt the most skilled knot-tyer in difficult circumstances in the world) Check out his blog f.stops all the way
Cheers
Friday, 13 November 2009
A little break...
Taking the lens cap off...
Hectic is a word to sum up life right now, infact I feel it's a luxurury to be sitting here writing on this.
The reason I feel I've done enough to grant me this luxury is that I handed in the first draft of my dissertation this morning..
As far as the project is going, lets not go there.... I'm stressing over a fox!
I need a fox (corpse) and I need it now! please please please be on the lookout.
If I'm going to have my prints done and mounted in time, then I need to have done my final shoot by next week (needless to say I could not sleep last night with stress, and that's on top of my 5am bedtime so I could get my draft done)...
I hate myself for being such a moaner, but really... this is stretching me to breaking point.
I'm very much looking forward to Christmas and having a break (by break, I mean finishing my dissertation!)
My heart has not been in this project, and it's hurting me to drag it out.. next project must be different.
anyway.. enough of the moaning...
okay, actually, one more thing.. my mbp (my mac) died last week.. (as did one of the lenses for my dslr)... both electrical techy problems that you can't fix with a screwdriver and a bit of oil, so technology is a bit of a fail in my books right now...
The camera in the photo below on the other hand was a technical marvel and a fascinating thing to have a play with..
(Arri SR3 with 9mm Distagon)
anyway.. where was I ...
Check out the new issue of Photoworks, co-edited by Jason Evans and with two articles written by Shiho Kito.
Jason is missed in Farnham, and Newport are bloody lucky...
The most exciting news of the moment is (though, I admit, by now it's old news) is that Anna Fox has been shortlisted for this years Deutsche Börse photography prize. The three other shortlisted photographers being Donovan Wylie (UK), Sophie Ristelhueber (France) and Zoe Leonard (USA)... obviously I have a slight bias towards Anna Fox, but whatever.. she deserves it, and looking around the majority of the major photography blogs, then it seems she has the masses behind her. fingers crossed! The winner will be announced on Wednesday 17 March 2010.
Anna is moving from being BA and MA course leader in Farnham to just being MA course leader, and we're having Stephen Bull (currently course leader at Portsmouth) who studied with Anna in Farnham. I've mentioned Stephen before in this blog after he gave an excellent talk last year as part of the visiting KesselsKramer exhibition, and just in general, Stephen is legendary for being 'the guy who graduated in photography without taking a photograph' - If you ask me, that's genius.. and his work is great. full stop.
From one Anna to another, I'm really looking forward to the Hotshoe Gallery Christmas Exhibition. It's five female photographers (Rut Blees Luxemburg, Anna Linderstam, Karen Knorr, Melanie Manchot & Clare Strand).. they will all be showing just one photo each, though no doubt the walls will still be trembling under the weight of the particular prints present!
Anna will be showing one of the images from her Triptych series (though I guess that makes it a triptych no more) that I assisted her with over summer.
Organisation of the Farnham Photography 2010 degree show is going well. We will be using the space that was used for the Rankin live exhibition over summer, (which is a huge 22,000 sqft beautiful bright space) but we're splitting the space into three, and two other Universities are having those spaces. Having to build two 94ft walls to split the space up will be an interesting experience, but I think it should add an interesting dynamic to the space and not to mention it helps that the ceiling is probably about 20ft high..
Last thing up.. I wanted to mention photographer Thom Bridge who was kind enough to mention this blog on his (and his brothers) blog BonzoBonzoBlog. Anyway, the point is, Thom is a brilliant photographer who makes beautiful photographs that seem all at once classic yet contemporary, vibrant yet subtle etc... beautiful photographs. See for yousrself, check out his webside here ThomBridge.com
All done...
Cheers!
Friday, 30 October 2009
Enter The Void
Enter The Void by Gaspar Noe (first shown in Cannes, then screened twice in London as part of the BFI 53rd London Film Festival.
I started writing about Enter The Void the same day as I saw it… That was 14 days ago. Since then It feels like I’ve been on my feet, busy and stressed ever since.
It feels good to sit down and write on here though.
Now, I’m not even going to try and be objective about this film..
Picture this.. 16/10/09 13.10, the film starts in about 5 minutes. We arrive at the BFI centre, look down at our tickets and realise we’re in completely the wrong place for the screening of Gaspar Noe’s new film; Enter The Void.
All six of us have managed to overlook this…
I spent the next few minutes wondering if I will actually get to see this film that I’ve been reading about for the past 2 years (following every little piece of information about its creation released on http://www.letempsdetruittout.net/gasparnoe/).
Waving down and jumping in a taxi, getting to Leicester Square (in that painfully slow London way) running up the 3 floors of the VUE cinema just in time to see ENTER THE VOID appear on the screen as I take my seat. This had all happened so fast that I’d hardly had time to relax and recompose myself before I was buffeted by the strobing, a visual trip, an out-of-body experience… the film, all 2 hours 43 minutes of it.
Fast forward to the end. The couple who sat to the left of me did not clap at the end, instead, as the lights went on, the woman sat staring forward blank-faced at the screen, traumatised. Maybe I’m being melodramatic, but the experience (and I’m emphasising the word ‘experience’ as supposed to ‘the film’) had me so emmersed and lost in it all that even two weeks later I’m struggling to say anything meaningful about it.
I hardly blinked through the whole film. The quality of the image was incredible. The sound was at times like a brick wall, smacking you in the face at all the right moments. It makes me so sad to think that’s probably going to be the only time I ever see this film on the big screen.
I had high high hopes for Enter The Void. After seeing Irreversible I quickly saught out his other works (Carne and Seul Contre Tous) as well as his shorts (We Fuck Alone, Eva, Intoxication etc)… And then I watched the films that inspired him (Salo, Staw Dogs, Angst, 2001). Irreversible had a big effect on me, and it really effected my work for quite a while (Jason Evans even told me that I needed to snap out of it), and is it sad that I’m chuffed that I was only about one metre away from Gaspar at one point? I must have read the general plot and seen the first stills for Enter The Void about a year ago. I’ve read almost everything there is out there in preparation for this film, but in the talk with Gaspr, there were still a few suprises.
He explained how he thinks of his own films as kind of black comedies. He described how Enter The Void was written before Irreversible, just that Irreversible took over when Cassel approached Noe to make a film. His first draft was for an exceptionally explicit romance starring Cassel and Belluci, however after the acting couple read the script the next day, they explained that it wasn’t going to happen. So overnight, he thought up Irreversible. And the rest is history. He explained how the cinematography in Irreversible was very much a practice-run for Enter The Void, and Enter The Void certainly showcases the spinning camera style that I love so much.
He also talked about his painter father Luis Felipe Noe (who’s paintings can be seen in Irreversible and Enter The Void) and painter uncle, who told him that if he wanted to be happy, he should be an artist. As Gaspar didn’t want to copy his father, and his mother was a big film buff, then the logical conclusion was to get into films.
Gaspar was very obviously a big film connoisseur, making David Cox (the interviewer and channel editor for FilmFour) seem pretty uninformed in comparison a few times through the talk.
He told one story of how he went to see his first porn film at the age of 15, and maybe to make him realise the errors of his ways, later that day his mother took him to see Pier Paolo Pasolini’s film Salo: or the 120 days of Sodom (anyone who has seen Salo will understand how shocking the thought of a 15year old seeing this is). A weird day for Gaspar, however its obvious things like this have given him the fascinating mind he has today.
I felt sorry for him in the talk, all everyone wanted to talk about was the shocking elements to Irreversible. When asked if he would ever make films without A. Sex or B. Violence, Gaspar answered No and maybe. Although he mentioned that he would like to make a film about kids (so, obviously no sex) and mentioned a kind of fascination with Bugsy Malone. Gaspar hinted that he strongly felt that his next film would be a documentary.
To wrap up, I realise that my writing on Enter The Void has been pretty atrocious, if you see the film some day or if you have seen the film, then you might identify with my lack of thought-structure.
All in all, Enter The Void is a huge success, the most incredible visual experience of my life. If people don’t like it, then the reason will be just because we are not ready for it.
Cheers
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