Paying more to see a tribute band than the real thing: World Book Day, and why the Kindle fails.

I remember World Book Day fondly as a child. We got a £1 book token, and off I went to WH Smiths to get my book, which was usually a brilliant Roald Dahl one. Now, at the age of 25, my over-riding memories of World Book Day are from when I was around 7 or 8, in a world in which if you wanted to know about a moment in history, details of a television series, or more about a musician, you looked in a book; hours were spent in the library looking up information on World War II, for example, first in an encyclopaedia, then a book on battles of note, taking you to specialist books on WWII. Now, we could find this information in 3 minutes on the internet, the very tool you are using to read this now.

How do children of this so-called “digital generation” still relate to books? I turned 13 when we got our first computer with internet, which was a little behind some other people, but by that point my relationship with books growing up was formed and if there had been a Kindle or e-book around then, I wouldn’t have been swayed. I think that relationship is very important growing up, not only through the process of learning to read, but the acts of taking books out of the library, the sheer size of some of the pictures books I remember looking at with my mum (probably smaller than A3, but that seemed substantial at age 6), and the emotional bond with those books. I still have many of the books I read as a child, as does my mum. I can’t imagine a situation where you would ask someone if they still have the books they read as a child and they respond to the tune of “no, all I read was on a Kindle/computer”, so they have no physical objects: that to me would be a BIG chunk of your childhood missing.

So, in this world, is the era of the book (or at least, printed word) dead? In my photography degree that’s coming to an end in June, the internet has been an invaluable tool in researching. If I need to know what year Ansel Adams took the famous photograph of Mirror Lake in Yosemite or the director of photography for the James Bond film Moonraker, I could find out both answers in the time it’s taken you to read this post so far.

However, to me, this only ever feels like the “prelude” to the research, which then takes place in books. Not only is there the vernacular of books (the relationship of typography and layout with the page, and in terms of photography books, the relationship of an image to the one on the opposite page and the ensuing narratives etc.) which you simply don’t get from scrolling down a page, but also there’s scientific studies that have proven that your mind takes in (and more importantly, remembers) information better on a printed page than a computer screen.

The digital world does some things very well, but books can’t die because the digital “replacements” are just imitations, and not convincing ones at that (I remember one of the adverts for a Kindle showed a tanned woman on the beach having a great time reading her Kindle, because apparently sand in a book is infinitely more trip-spoiling than in the nooks and crannies of an electronic device). In the music world, we were being convinced that iPods were the future of music: I know personally of several people whose CD collection was their life, and they downloaded the lot to their iPod and sold them (usually at a tenth of what they paid for them). About 3 years ago, my local well-known music store jettisoned half its CD racks in favour of an iPod section, only to nearly go under: last year they had a vinyl section again and vinyl has hit a sales high not reached since 1996 (including Pink Floyd’s latest record, The Endless River, being the fastest selling record since 1997): the message here? People will always come back to the real thing.

Fifty Shades of Grey, while may be remembered more as the film version, showed that the power of a book is still alive and kicking. While arguably not quite a groundbreaking future classic on par with To Kill a Mockingbird, The War of the Worlds or even On The Road, it shows that in a digital world, it’s still a book (whether you were a fan or not) that engaged with people, got them talking and made newspaper and chat show fodder for several months after it’s release.

This is why I believe the book will never die, and that the Kindle and e-book will be a passing phase and something we look back on in years to come with a cynical smile. Each generation has one of these moments; for my parents it was the 8-track cassette in the late 70s, and for me it was the “wonders” of w@p internet on your phone, circa 2003. If either of those things has made you pause and think either “what is that?” or “Oh ... I remember having/hearing about that”, then remember that feeling, because that’s surely how your son or daughter will react to you mentioning your beach-damaged Kindle in 20 years time.

"I’m also a photographer" – Andy Summers and the release of Can’t Stand Losing You

In a week that sees a Valentine’s Day U.S release for Andy Summers’ Can’t Stand Losing You, the film based on Police guitarists’ best-selling memoir One Train Later (we in the UK have to wait until 20^th March), it is also worth remembering that Summers is also a very accomplished photographer in his own right. Remember? You didn’t know in the first place? Well, that’s ok as the phrase “don’t give up your daytime job” seems to be invented for people who become renowned in one area, and because of that are given free reign in another: musicians who think they can act (remember Rihanna’s star-making turn in Battleship? Me neither) and worse still, actors who think they should sing (there are exceptions of course: people as disparate as Peter Falk and Derren Brown are also gifted painters). So upon hearing that a musician has been taking photographs, you’d be forgiven for thinking they’re not necessarily going to be world-beating.

 

Happily, Summers’ work stands apart from his record-breaking time with The Police. In fact, had he not answered Steward Copeland’s ad, he quite possibly could’ve become a bigger name in the photography world without the baggage of being “a rock guy” as well. I came across his work by being a fan of The Police, and enjoying his back-stage shots and candid moments in the studio, but very quickly discovered that there was more to them (and my interest in them) than that, and a keen eye for composition and drama was evident in all of his work, as well as evidence of inspiration from Henri Cartier-Bresson, Robert Frank, Ralph Gibson and even Edward Hopper.

 
He exclusively used B&W 35mm film (generally favouring a high contrast printing style), and all the rock-band-on-tour clichés are captured, with a much greater sense of intimacy. The self-portrait above for example couldn’t have been taken by a Jill Furmanovsky or a Mick Rock, because the trademark Police grins would come out, and as a result Summers’ Police world is vastly different than the Technicolor blond hair shots we’re used to seeing.
  

All bands now have a behind-the-scenes photographer, and we know what to expect. Summers captures those moments of wiping a post-gig brow with a towel, and an over-flowing craft service table, but includes the moments that any sensible editor wouldn’t: behind all the grinning fans, there’s promiscuity, which while it’s makes for a beautiful photograph, Summers cynically highlights the shallow nature of that relationship, while still indulging.

There’s also drug use, and the jet set myth-busting moments of looking miserable in airports (as well as an abundance of shots on buses, and later, their own private plane), and a notable absence of forced mugging and joshing, which is the staple of band shots when taken by an outsider.
 In the film, Summers shares memories and photos from the band’s career, leading up to their much-hyped 2007 reunion tour. Even those of us that don’t own any of the music, we all know the words to Roxanne when it still regularly pops up on the radio, and we all know the ironic misconception behind the lyrics to Every Breath You Take, so whether you are a casual or die-hard fan, prepare to have another world opened up to you in the form of Andy Summers’ photography, and perhaps never again will you be cynically sceptical when you hear that a musician is also a photographer.

"There is a moment when you want to read a magazine, not a novel" - Bono

Current listening: Jon & Vangelis – Private Collection

I’m going to do some shooting at London Fashion Week at the end of the month, and some of the images can be uploaded in to a competition run by Canon, with the stipulation that they be submitted at a maximum of 45 minutes after the shoot. The subtext is surely then that they should be unedited, or at the very least, without days of manipulation to create something almost wholly unrecognisable from the reality they claim to be depicting.

With this in mind, I decided to submit some work to the brilliant Dreamingless magazine, who only accepts photography that has had no editing on the models. I found them on Twitter after taking part in #sbhour (from 8-9pm on a Sunday) and sent off 2 projects of mine, both of which included little (or no) editing at all.
I’ve had some work in an online magazine before, as well as my own (Magpie), and that’s fantastic and of course I’m very grateful, but for me there’s something much more satisfying about having my work in an actual printed magazine, as that was what I fell in love with in the first place (both magazines as a genre, and my work that had magazines as a final destination in mind). The experience of being able to sit down and flick through the magazine, which, as the title of this blog (which was stolen from Zoo TV era Bono) references, there’s also a lightness to them (in comparison to a book) that I love. Even though they are essentially the same format, it made me think of the way Stephen Shore compared the difference in feel between Polaroid SX-70 prints and then trying to recreate the square look on the Hassleblad: “it always felt weightier; it never had that light touch”.
Anyway, I’m very flattered that Zoe Michelle at Dreamingless (who is also a talented photographer) liked my work and my writing, so here is a little snippet of each project before they come out in their March and April issues respectively:

The Space Between

This first shot of Tia was taken without the following notions, but now I can see they were present in my subconscious thinking: The use of pure, white high key light to reflect a youthful, enthusiastic innocence I wanted to capture, and her looking up at us and drawing us in like a doe-eyed Jean Shrimpton-esque character, and the tousle-haired, black lipstick look that hints at (with a little subtlety) sex, but not in an overly gratuitous way.

However, this second shot shows a more real, unbiased view of Tia: Both have our eye contact, but with very different connotations, more relaxed and a picture of someone who loved being around her friends and laughing.

This is the Tia I know, and by having these friendships with the people I shoot, I can capture this, much more indicative of her personality than this shot, which is a construct of the male gaze.

I think it shines even brighter amidst the trash

With these shots, I jumped in head-first with an “everything and the kitchen sink” approach, influenced in particular by a quote from sitcom, Frasier. Upon Frasier Crane deciding he needed an orchestra for his radio station jingle, his brother Niles asks "Haven't you heard of less is more?" to which he responds "ah yes, but if less is more, just think how more more will be!"

When using a piece of equipment for the first time, I like to be as experimental as possible; to use everything at the very peak of its ability so I know what it's capable of, before dialling it down for the desired effect.

This time my intention was to take things that I usually gave a wide berth (saturated colours that blew out detail, melodramatic wind machines, cheap plastic gems etc.) and keep everything on “full”.

The title comes from an interview with Bono in Rolling Stone from 1992 (“There is a lot of soul - I think it shines even brighter amidst the trash and the junk”) in regards to their fantastic Zoo TV tour of that year, which eschewed the earnest B&W Joshua Tree image in favour of a widescreen colour makeover, in which they embraced all the contradictions of the rock world, and Bono’s new onstage persona became a leather and shades-clad lounge lizard, sans sincerity.

I didn’t want to manipulate the images afterwards, so another reason of turning the colour up as far as it would go is that I didn’t want to boost the saturation digitally after the fact, so the colours you see here are what the room looked like: I liked the idea that they looked so drenched in colour your hand would turn pink if you touched them.

These are images that won't be featured in the magazine features (but from the same projects, respectively) so keep a look out for the brilliant Dreamingless magazine!

 

Jennifer Lawrence in Vanity Fair - or "What The Serpent Said"

As a photographer, I find myself often thinking about pastiche and (in this case, referred to as) homage; what hasn’t already been done? Especially in the world of fashion and portraiture, where every “edgy” glossy advert owes a substantial debt to Guy Bourdin, and any portrait with a white high key background had better be taken by David Bailey otherwise you are almost certainly going to fall fowl of what John Szarkowski noted as (when talking about the early experimentation in colour photography in William Eggleston’s Guide) “their sad fate to remind us of something similar, but better”.

However, referencing something that has already happened gets you a foot in the door when trying to get attention, or put a persuasive message across. It can be used in the interests of power: if you’re referencing something that is already legendary, you’re already a step up.

On the back of the phone hacking scandal late last year, it’s hard to think of another public figure that had more coverage because of this hacking (which affected a fair few names of course) than Jennifer Lawrence, and the majority of the mainstream media seemed intent at taking her down a peg or two. She was an outspoken and rapidly rising star, and here was a scandal that in the right (or rather, wrong) hands, could finish her career for good. The fact that they were personal, naked self-portraits that were leaked in an act than Lawrence herself referred to as abuse was largely ignored, and the mention of her name now had the footnote “who was the main target of the recent hacking scandal”.

In a recent issue of Vanity Fair, it featured an in-depth interview about the incident, as well as an exclusive photo shoot with Patrick Demarchelier.

Any quotes from the interview hoping to set the record straight were lost in the flotsam and jetsam of Twitter trends; however one photograph in particular from the shoot stuck out and immediately swung the balance of power back in her favour, and referencing an already famous shot. Although her leaked photos were more explicit, they now seem obsolete in light of this.
 

Nastassja Kinski and the Serpent - Richard Avedon (1981)

It was an attempt to reclaim her position after the scandal, and show her in a position of power, and the simple and attention-grabbing visual message that she wasn’t against posing naked (or at least, implied), but that it should be on her terms. More implicit in the Avedon image are overtones of religion (specifically Christianity) with the "serpent" speaking in her ear. Lawrence uses the subtext of sin with an element of humour. It’s not necessarily an attempt at an original piece, but shows that not all homage is derivative or to be taken as a copy at face value.
  

Jennifer Lawrence - Patrick Demarchelier (2014)

So in this case, the homage is part of the narrative, something we can look back at in years to come to visually tell the story of how Lawrence responded with dignity, class; a check mate made as public as possible. This image has now become shorthand for the scandal, and how she regained control of her image.