Big Bother

I absolutely hate Big Brother. There, I've said it.

The impending oppression of having this ridiculous cult of hollow celebrity forced on us is horrible. Ooh, I really don't like it do I? And it will be forced - we won't be able to go anywhere without it being rubbed in our faces like sandpaper. Please - if you hate Big Brother too - don't feel alone in that instinct to cut the plug off your telly cable, and don't feel isolated in your urge to torch the piles of BB obsessed rag they call newspapers that you will be tripping over in your local shops. Don't actually do those things, but don't feel weird for thinking them either!

Instead of the big bother, which starts again tonight, here are some proper things to try instead:

1. Bake some excellent cookies, take them to a friend and find out how their real day was.

2. Grow some stuff - tomatoes maybe, or herbs, easy things that smell great. Basil's good and you can do homemade pesto with it. mmmmm...

3. Go and run, wherever you like. Appreciate the fact you have freedom to do this.

4. Or feeling edgy? Go climb an Extreme route somewhere, like this one Greg and I did at Easter. That'll sort you out.

5. Pull up a chair to the window and sit there for an hour just watching and listening. Best telly in the world.

6. Sort your photos into albums! (that old job, boo! It is good though, and bet you catch yourself smiling...)

7. Read a book - you know those things with pages that have words on. I can recommend this by John O'Donahue, some very poetic ideas about the shelter of true friendship. Or Tenderness of Wolves - and let me know what you think, I'm reading this at the moment.

8. Lie down and listen to some music with your eyes closed. Guarantee you'll lose track of time and your eyes will thank you for the break.

9. "Who goes? You decide!" Utter rubbish. Instead of nurturing unhealthy judgmental energy voting out out a complete stranger from a fake community, go and encourage a real person - someone you actually know - that they're brilliant and valuable and make the world a better place.

And finally:

10. That thing that occurred to you while you were sitting at the window for an hour, that wildest dream that bravely found time to bubble up, go do it.


Big Brother is crafty, it does suck you in, but don't ever let it numb you so much you stop living a real life and fail to notice the softness of people around you.




{Today's soundtrack: Chat with the lads in the studio}

hang on...

Actually, although that last post is probably accurate in many ways, what I'd prefer to say is this:

Be drawn back into peace and expect to be held there.
May God make his face shine upon you;
may you find the pathway extends straight in front of you,
and may light guide your feet as you go forward on your path.
Bringing you peace and blessings so you may know
the shelter of the heavenly wing.

phew

I was just in the middle of a big angry rant about football after watching the good folk of Bristol mob the streets to cheer Bristol Rovers home from their Wembley triumph, then depressed myself too much, so will save that to unleash on you when I'm truly grumpy. Instead, I'm putting this picture up again because its energy and sentiment reflect just how wild life is feeling at the moment - mostly in a good way. I love this photo, and Rufus too as I've said before (check November's archive), although the other photos from this day were lost when all my stuff got nicked... Bittersweet, but isn't that life? So go on my friend, show us how much you care! And do it for me 'cos I'm feeling a bit frazzled. x

(By the way, the effects of Saturday's thrill have subsided a little as I can't quite believe what lies ahead. As a friend of mine who I climb with repeats when things are looking hairy, "Just climb what's in front of you". Phew. Deep breaths... I will be able to explain in time.)


{Today's soundtrack: A calm playlist entitled Little Chill FM}

Oh Happy Day!

Amazing, amazing, amazing. I've just had some ***amazing*** news about a job, and don't really know what to do with myself - everyone else is out of town (in spite of the terrible forecast) so not sure where to go or what to do with the happiness except run 100 laps around my house and try not to freak the neighbours out with my happy squealing. And there was me trying to stay calm and pretend I was really laid back about it. I knew there was a reason to stay back at base...



YAHOOOOO!


{Today's soundtrack: Oh Happy Day - The Edwin Hawkins Singers}

Would Rather Be...

Rubbish, rubbish, rubbish. Rain for the holidays, and lots of it. Got me thinking of somewhere I'd rather be, and in the company of treasures who I miss like mad. Si, Shirl and the littles on Piha beach, west coast of North Island, New Zealand. Here's my photo story for your bank holiday delight, should the rain prevent your adventuring outside.










{Today's soundtrack: Gorecki again, as I took an early run around the docks... beautiful}

A Tribute

Here's to a thing that grows: a seed hidden away in its earthy privacy.

This is the thing about seeds: just when no one is looking, because we've probably given up waiting–and this is the bit that never fails to bowl me over–it spikes itself up out of the soil and points to the light, and it keeps on pointing and spiking and moving up and out, and then insists on establishing its roots so as to make sprigs and buds and fruit of its own, just keeps going and going. And it's only then that you get to see what it's shape is, shade and thickness of leaf, its resilience in the wind, fragrance as you run your fingers up the leaves, and just how hairy those leaves are!



Seeds are sown for us humans all the time - soulful seeds of ideas, feelings, instincts and connections. How is it so difficult to remember the quiet time a seed needs to do its work in private, and not prod and interfere? Leave that polythene cover over the rich soil and trust...


If we are to achieve anything revolutionary in this life then it initially takes three things: wisdom to realise when a seed has been sown, patience to leave it alone and faith that there is growth happening in a place you can't–and shouldn't–reach. Trusting there is positive progress in something that can't be seen simply has to be an act of faith, and trying to obtain physical proof of this growth will destroy the seed.

Of course, once it's out in the open then love it to the heavens.

(And with today's eye on plants here's a wee homage to Elliot Erwitt, a photographer I met while at Magnum Photos. Fair to say that without Magnum I wouldn't be here, but boy, were there some real juicy seeds growing back there...)




{Today's Soundtrack: the only way is up...

Not really, it's Freelance Hellraiser - Want You To Know}

Want you to know you made me happy
Want you to know you made me sad
Want you to know you made me happy
You are the best thing that I ever had

PS. Apologies for the poor technical quality of these images - they were taken on my phone.

Orange Badge

Dare I be so honest as to confess I'm feeling a bit tearful at the moment? Sometimes things just creep up and get ya, right when you're least expecting. However, this little orange badge came to my help glowing out amongst the cram of memories on my pinboard. It felt like seeing it for the first time, so I tried to shoot the way it stood out. Simple and cute, unashamedly so.


And there were more Circles of Confusion again at sunrise, though they were perfectly still while the swifts squealed past in the huge and clear morning air. No momentary overlap and moving on - they were just resting with each other.


I pray today that we all find our places to rest and be soothed, and that this doesn't have to be complicated.


{Today's soundtrack: Turin Brakes - The Optimist LP}

Circles of Confusion

Ok, I know I said I was off the lightbox for a few days but that is overturned as of 6am, when this happened:



A tree outside my bedroom window stands between me and the sun, and its leaves layer up to form thousands of tiny pinholes through which the sun presses. By the time these exact pinhole beams reach the wall next to me they have defracted and grown into soft pools of light. As the breeze provokes a shiver in the tree, the leafy pinholes shift about and cause these 'circles of confusion' (as they are technically known) to dance around with each other.

Their frenetic shifting happens so quickly, these circles appear to move in rhythm but there is actually nothing predictable about them at all - even their density comes and goes with cloud cover. They momentarily overlap like neat Venn diagrams, with the shared segment being brighter than the solo shape, but are in perpetual motion, quick to pass and change. They are impossible to catch, their boundaries are multiple, and they are a constant catching of breath. I adore them. They tell me about us.



{Today's soundtrack: Ray LaMontagne - Be Here Now}

The Little Scientist

Sorry, we're deviating from the photography today! I'm off the lightbox for a few days so thought I'd post this little book mark while we're pondering the role of photography as a dialogue.

So today's post is a small illustration from a book I'm designing about a trip to Durban: photographs, illustrations and words about street kids. (Another image from this project appears in this post). The background to this illustration-not-photograph is explained in the text below, which is an excerpt from my journal. The face in the picture is that of a street kid who's eyes were leaking big, fat tears down his cheeks one day on the beach. He thought one of his friends had stolen his banana - one he'd been given after a surf lesson from a street team volunteer. I call him the little scientist simply because he wears a white lab coat, but his grasp of reality is far from scientific.

Working on my book spreads yesterday and thinking about those cloudy angels, well, it got me wondering about the limits of personal photographic expression. I couldn't shoot that moment with the little scientist, so had to draw it. These words explain a little better:

.......

TEARS

Tears from the little scientist.

Tears are not my cue for a photograph. They tell me something much deeper about a fragile soul who needs my compassion and tenderness, not a cheap shot. It’s another betrayal of the tough man image these kids will give you for the first couple of photographs, a reminder that they are young boys forced to grow up way beyond their years. Whatever the street law, deep down they are still just shaky kids emerging into adolescence with all the terror and confusion that this brings to a person’s life, both in their personal relationships and their understanding of how the world works.

Immense fragility.

.......


{Today's soundtrack: Gorillaz - Demon Days}

Angels

I'm finding it difficult to write about this image. It's unusual for me to make such a straight record of something I see, like forensic evidence. It's a one-sided statement and I feel odd being speechless in the face of this vision (compositionally, I mean), with much of my work being about a conversation of some sort. But there we are - and for some reason it seems important today that I share my vapourous angels with you, these extraordinary and solitary clouds.

All I can tell you is they appeared at a very poignant time, and confirmed for me that certain people do come along in very special and timely ways to walk with you when you need it. They may not know it, but I believe that's true. Enjoy the presence of these guys. With love. x


{Today's soundtrack: Gorecki - Symphony No. 1, Lento}

Bill Nighy

Last night, some of my fellow lecturers, me and our photography students got together for a joint exhibition of our colour photographs. We're all gearing up for the final projects and end of year shows, so this is like a great warm up a few weeks beforehand. Mostly, I knew this exhibition would consist of quiet landscape and thoughtful, derelict interiors, plenty of intelligent conceptual work and some beautiful abstracts, but I was right in predicting there wouldn't be very much eye contact. I thought I'd address that by submitting this single picture of Bill, because it makes me smile everytime I look at it, and I figure there are a few people around who could do with that too - not least those students who are working so hard at the moment and really feeling the pressure.

Here's to you - you'll be grand.


{Today's soundtrack: 6music}

A Place With No Roof

Sitting at my white table last week, I was moved to look again at these pictures of my first days in that North London house. There was no roof on my attic room, just bare rafters at the top of the stairs. That place and time was so loaded with impossible hopes - somehow this sad but delicious light drawing us in sums it up... and I wasn't sure then whether I should be looking up or down.



This third photograph shows me sitting in what was to become the white table position, and I remember being perched up there on the bare rafters wondering how life might feel with a roof on it again, heck, even a front door would have been simply beautiful. But despite the sadness, these images hold for me a calm quietness that I still carry today through the anarchy of all life's build projects.

It's a curious thing, to realise even when you think you're at your weakest you're building strong muscles for later on.


{Today's soundtrack: news headlines about Tony Blair standing down}

Polly

The wind has been going mad with the trees for a couple of days now and I get a real tingle watching and listening for the movement in those resilient branches. It's seasons shifting, and catching a scent on the air that reminds me of something brilliant, but distant and undefined. It creates an atmosphere of reflection along with the sense that something else exciting is on its way. Super-sensory...

Polly's expression here describes that feeling quite well, understated though, and caught in a space between gusts.

Yes, this is how today feels, in a small space between gusts.


{Today's soundtrack: Maximo Park - Books from Boxes}

Two Years

A table in an upper room somewhere in North London. This was my room when I lived in London, and although I moved back home to Bristol two years ago I still visit my friends here often. They insist I keep my house keys.

In two years it's the first time I've sat at this table working, and in those two years life has changed to become almost unrecognisable. In this bare room, quite empty except for this table and the few things I've travelled with, I can't avoid reflection.

Two years ago, I chose the carpet and colours for the walls, then I painted this table white and put it in the place it still sits today. I gathered some tools around me to work, kept taking photographs, and arranged pencils and paper on the table to help me record the gentle untangling of thoughts that was going on–it was a difficult time: I'd not long given up work to return to college, and then moved to London to work on placement at Magnum Photos. I was really frightened and confused. The last time I sat working at this table I was about to fly to South Africa to shoot a story about a teenage community living on the streets of Durban. I moved home right after that moving trip.

Today, two years later, I'm back, and soothed by the peace up here in this attic. London is a big, stinky old place and I don't cope so well with it, but this upper room was like a cocoon at a time I really needed one. It's only 3 flights up but the noise and stink of London fades away, and I feel thanks for this little place. It is a place where I began putting myself back together, tending to the cracks in my walls like those in the photograph. There was stuff piled up all around the room. Now, the simplicity of this space makes me smile and well up at the same time. Its emptiness is a relief, but a part of me mourns a younger version of me that I left behind here.

In two years I can't begin to describe how life has changed, except through this quiet, white table, still in place, the little pink heart-shaped chair and those mended cracks in the wall behind...


{Today's soundtrack: Gorecki - Symphony No. 3, Tranquillissimo}

The Rock and the Wave

Come a bit closer... the rock and the wave again. Pulling certain sections of this image into isolation, it's hard to tell which is which.

Rock and wave. Something about each gives the other its purpose, but I've often wondered–when feeling like a breaker that crashes against the cliff, or alternatively feeling the breaker thundering over my being–how this relationship can exist at all. There's so much tension in it, but so much poise at the same time. Is that right?

I relate to the behavior of both, and appreciate what one gives the other. I hate the pain of the crash, but love the grace in discovering how to move with the force. The one requires the other in order to exist as it does.

Keep watching, keep feeling. Are you the rock or the wave?


{Today's soundtrack: The Freelance Hellraiser - Waiting for Clearance}