St. Decay in Cornwall Today

My book of infrared photos of Cornwall, Welcome to St. Decay, is featured in this month's Cornwall Today magazine, available from most supermarkets and book shops in the county. Photos from the book grace the cover and a six-page article (which I also wrote). I'm extremely grateful to the team at Cornwall Today, in particular Tim Dixon, for featuring my photos.

Previously on Barnflakes
Welcome to St. Decay

Flickagrams #20

Notes on Fay Godwin, photographer

Fay Godwin is perhaps my favourite British landscape photographer – a label she hated, insisting on being called a documentary photographer instead. Born in 1931, Fay Godwin's interest in photography began with taking shots of her young children in the 1960s; she had no formal training. There could be said to be two halves to her photography career: the first half consisting of portraits of famous authors and poets of the 1970s, from Kingsley Amis to Philip Larkin, whom her husband, a book publisher, introduced her to.

The second half to her career was as a documentary photographer (she said she would have been a photo journalist if it wasn't for her children) – though, to be fair, she is documenting landscape, and the changes made by humans. Humour me for a second, if you will, and Google the term 'landscape photography' – the result is beautiful, over-saturated sunsets and misty mornings; picture postcard depictions of our idea of a traditional landscape, unchanged since paintings of old. Fay Godwin rejected traditional notions of landscape and beauty. By all accounts a strong-willed, opinionated and daunting woman, she found most postcard photography "absolutely revolting". Despite her objections to such concepts, her photos are actually beautiful, but with a mythical depth much modern photography lacks.

She separated from her husband in 1969; he died suddenly in 1976. Around the same time Fay was diagnosed with cancer, but it didn't stop her stomping around the countryside in all weather carrying a heavy tripod and medium format camera or becoming president of the Ramblers' Association (from 1987-1990). Godwin developed her landscape photography throughout the 1970s and 80s, and produced several photography books to critical acclaim. She called England a "grotty little country" but she liked the light and the history.

In her later years she embraced digital and colour photography, using Photoshop and a scanner to scan objects found on the beach. She died in 2005, aged 74.

Previously on Barnflakes 
Notes on Nicholas Syracuse, photographer
Notes on Max Pam, photographer
Notes on Stephen Gill, photographer

Neil Krug and Pulp Art Book

I love Pulp Art Book, a psychedelic, LP-sized tome of Cindy Shermanesque, fictional B-movie stills taken with sun-bleached out-of-date Polaroids of Joni Harbeck, model/girlfriend, then wife, of photographer Neil Krug. The creative duo Krug and Harbeck first published the photos on Flickr, causing a wave of publicity, which resulted in two volumes of Pulp Art Book bring published, Vol 1 in 2011, and Vol 2 in 2012.

I originally assumed the pictures were taken in the 1960s or 70s, and Krug a grizzly veteran from the counter culture movement. Au contraire; he is a 36-year old, L.A. based art director, creating album covers for the likes of Tame Impala (above, a deserted desert diamond mine town in Namibia I've always wanted to visit) and Lana Del Rey.

Notes on Nicholas Syracuse, photographer

Young American photographer from Arizona who travels the States photographing drifters. The above photos are from his black and white project Highway; his other project, Traveler, is in colour. Both can be found on his website.

Untitled (L.A. in Cornwall reflection)

Previously on Barnflakes
Untitled (Fish & Hips)
Untitled (legs in air)

Welcome to St. Decay

Cornwall as it's never been seen before, in glorious infrared. Welcome to St. Decay – the book – celebrates Cornwall's mining heritage through a luridly-bright colour palette.

Taken over a six-month period walking and cycling around the Cornish countryside from St. Agnes to St. Austell, the book explores nature's gradual but inevitable reclamation of the man-made, focusing on abandoned engine houses where ivy climbs the chimneys and walls. For me, these engine houses are as grand and beautiful as any cathedral or castle and deserve to be celebrated.

All photos were taken by me with an infrared camera, and the book was designed by myself.

Book specifications:
Softback, full colour, 62 pages, size 120x120mm.
£9.99.

Get it on Etsy now!

Untitled (Fish & Hips)

Previously on Barnflakes
Untitled (legs in air)

Notes on Max Pam, photographer

Max Pam (b. 1949, Melbourne, Australia) is my favourite photographer no one's heard of. I came across an exhibition of his randomly whilst living in Sydney in 1999: Signature Works – 25th Anniversary Exhibition was showing at the Australian Centre for Photography. I was blown away by the exhibition and some of Pam's books on display, including the award-winning Going East, which looks at his Asia photos over a twenty year period. I'd arrived in Sydney after spending six months in SE Asia; Pam's extraordinary black and white travel photos resonated with me.

With a spirit of adventure, Pam had set off for India, aged 19, having never left home before. Influenced by 19th century British photographers and travellers John Thomson and Samuel Bourne, who were some of the first photographers to record China and India respectively, Pam spent the next two decades photographing the continent with a medium format camera, from vistas of the Himalayas to intimate portraits of prostitutes in Manila.

Shooting with a wide angle lens and a long exposure (up to five seconds), many of Pam's photos are 'street portraits' – outdoor, posed shots of people who he builds a rapport with, maybe two or three individuals, with all manner of life going on around them – and often at least one blurred element, usually a person moving. For Pam, aside from the connection to the 19th century pioneers (who didn't have fast exposures for their cameras), the blurring represents "that power that is swirling all around... it's that energy that is inherent in everyone." (Pam never takes candid photos, going so far as to call them 'stolen' photos and an aggressive act.) But it's hard to pin Pam down. He also takes wonderful shots of nudes, and pictures of hands holding strange objects. In his books, he's interested in the juxtapostion of the double page spread.

Like Stephen Gill, Alec Soth, Martin Parr (who has published three volumes on the subject; Pam's Going East features in volume two) and many other contemporary photographers, the photo book is paramount to Pam. Drawing inspiration from traditional Indian illuminated manuscripts, and admiring of the sketchbooks the painting students filled in whilst he was at art college in the 1960s, Pam has produced many photo books which contain journals, found objects, drawings, maps and collage. In this respect, they are similar to the work of Peter Beard, the photographer once described as 'half-Tarzan, half-Byron', who died a couple of weeks ago. His extraordinary collage books contain extracts from his diaries and journals which contain all manner of found objects and photos, densely multi-layered, from blood and calligraphy to paintings and pressed flowers. The Journals of Dan Eldon – the English photojournalist stoned to death in Mogadishu in 1993, aged 22 – published as The Journey is the Destination, also contains a delightful and intimate mix of collage, painting, found objects, writing and photography.

All three photographers – Max Pam, Peter Beard and Dan Eldon – blur the line between photographer and artist, their diaries and journals are living, chaotic and creative accounts of their lives, with photography being just one element in the multi-layered mishmash of writing, painting, graphic design, collage and found object.

Pam has published twenty books in a career spanning fifty years. He now teaches photomedia in Perth.

Visual Instincts was an Australian TV series and book, edited by Max Pam, published in 1989 which explored five contemporary Australian photographers: Emmanuel Angelicas, Jon Lewis, Fiona Hall, Grant Mudford and Max Pam. The series can be found free to watch on Kanopy, which I mentioned recently.

There is a Max Pam on Instagram but there's only a few shots of book spreads on there. Anyway, a missed opportunity – he should have gone for the username InstaPam.

There's an interesting interview with Pam at The Kitab, an Indian website which explores the photo book.

maxpam.com

Notes on Stephen Gill, photographer

I've been admiring Stephen Gill's photography since first seeing his work in The Guardian Weekend magazine in the early 2000s. Initially focusing on London's East End where he lived after moving from Bristol, Gill built up an experimental and conceptual body of work on all aspects of his chosen part of London, from its ponds and waterways to its markets and allotments, its themes ranging from cultural to environmental.

Like Alec Soth, who is everywhere all the time for no apparent reason (I'd never heard of him until a year ago, even though I recently found I'd had a photography book of his for years), Gill is keen on the idea of the photographic book, and self-publishes them through his company, Nobody Books.

In 2014 Gill moved to Sweden, where he spent over four years working on his book, The Pillar, which came out last year. Ostensibly a bird book, though possibly not one twitchers or professional nature photographers would approve of as such; the stunning photos were taken with a low-resolution motion sensor camera set up next to the titular pillar, a wooden post nearby to Gill's home in the wilds of Sweden. Capturing a variety of birds from a sparrow to an eagle, the birds often appear awkward and contorted yet somehow more natural than we're used to seeing them.

As Karl Ove Knausgård writes in The Pillar: "I’d never seen birds in this way before, as if on their own terms, as independent creatures with independent lives. Ancient, forever improvising, endlessly embroiled with the forces of nature, and yet indulging too. And so infinitely alien to us."

stephengill.co.uk

Notes on cyanotypes

A cyanotype is a cameraless photography process that originated in 1842, not long after the birth of photography. It involves coating paper (or any other material) with a mixture of two chemicals – ferric ammonium citrate and potassium ferricyanide – and exposing it to sunlight or UV light. When the paper is rinsed in water it oxidises to create beautiful Prussian blue (not exactly cyan) images.

By placing interesting objects (leaves and feathers are always a winner but any object with a distinctive shape will do, making it the perfect lockdown project – there's no need to leave the house) on the paper in the sun, the paper exposed to the light will go blue, leaving a white silhouette of the placed object.

If this sounds technical or complicated, it's not, for I accomplished it with ease. Look online for packs of cyanotype or sun sensitive paper. On a sunny day, place the paper either outside in the sun or on a sunlit windowsill inside. Put the objects on the paper for 10-30 minutes, depending how sunny the day (if using flat, light objects like leaves or feathers, it's a good idea flattening them with a piece of glass against the paper; the images will turn out sharper and they won't blur the picture by moving). Rinse the print in cold water for a minute, then leave in a shallow tray of water for five. If you're into photography and will probably never have a darkroom, watching the image magically appearing as you rinse it is probably the nearest you'll get to the darkroom experience.

It's much easier buying pre-coated paper in packs, but if game why not try buying the two chemicals and coating your own paper or other material (I've seen examples online printed on shells).

Cyanotypes were invented by Sir John Herschel. He thought they had no artistic merit, and indeed the process was used by engineers up to fairly recently to produce architectural blueprints. Photographer and botanist Anna Atkins used the process to illustrate her herbarium. Although the intention was largely scientific, the results were beautiful, and her 1843 book, Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions, is said to be the world's first photographically illustrated book.

On Flickr
A cyanoytpe I did years ago of water pistols turned out pretty cool, like an X-ray.

Untitled (legs in air)

Empty skateparks

Skateboarding photography is usually about capturing the skater in action, but not always. Californian photographer Amir Zaki has recently published a book of empty skateparks in his home state. Titled California Concrete: A Landscape of Skateparks, the book is a beautiful brutalist monument to the board, his highly detailed photos taken at dawn (one of them, top), each one consisting of dozens of high resolution photos stitched together in post-production.

Irish photographer Richard Gilligan spent four years tracking down and photographing homemade or DIY skateparks all over the world. Mostly being built illegally, this was no mean task, with the skateparks being in hidden, abandoned locations. The image, above middle, is from Hamburg, Germany.

Teenage Scottish photographer Andrew Bulloch has only owned a camera for a few years and already won a handful of awards. I love his picture from north Scotland of an empty half pipe with the northern lights behind it (picture above).

With skateboarding appearing as a sport for the first time at this year's Toyko Olympics and Sotheby's last year selling a complete set of 248 Supreme boards for $800,000, its rebellious attitude is perhaps not as it was. Nevertheless, I still love skating culture, from the sense of community and fun, to the graphics, videos and photography. Skateparks are appearing in most cities all over the world, and more popular than ever (so seeing an empty one, like the pictures above, is pretty rare).

Previously on Barnflakes
Record cover of the day: Babes Forever
Powell Peralta Paraphemalia
Transworld Skateboarding Magazine Covers

Elsewhere on the web
The Search for Animal Chin is the most quotable and best skateboarding film ever, dude!

Infra ready

 

Infrared images top to bottom: Bob Dylan by Elliott Landy (1969); Richard Mosse's stunning Congo series, Infra (2011); Kate Ballis' surreal vision of Palm Springs, Infra Realism (2018); Foals album Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost (2019), photo by Vicente Muñoz.

Dabbling

It’s fairly well known that photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson all but abandoned photography some twenty years before his death – at aged 95, mind; so you could say he retired at a normal age, then did some drawing classes – which is what, say, my dad has done but without the poncy bit saying he insists on drawing as his true calling, which is what Cartier-Bresson said, though apparently it was his first love. But like Bob Dylan’s recent artwork, Cartier-Bresson’s are pretty mediocre. Worse, as also with Dylan’s, they take away all the mystery and beauty so evident in their ‘day jobs’ (photography/music).

Quite a few musicians and actors also paint (and many more are also photographers, such as Lou Reed, David Byrne, Julian Lennon, Andy Summers, Bryan Adams and Jeff Bridges – though everyone's a photographer now, of course, and a web designer, and a writer, and a film-maker, etc). Most are mediocre, but obviously their works sell for thousands of pounds, like Ronnie Wood's. Actor Anthony Quinn's paintings are actually pretty good.

Less well-known and perhaps more interesting is photographers and film-makers who make music. After all, both professions are about filling space. Photographers William Eggleston and Wolfgang Tillmans and filmmakers David Lynch and Alejandro Jodorowsky (in my mind, two of our most prominent living polymaths, encompassing between them film, painting, music, writing, acting, transcendental meditation, psychogenealogy and just about everything in between).

After having his photos adorn numerous album covers (from Big Star and Joanna Newsom to Primal Scream and Silver Jews), it took until he was 78 for William Eggleston to make his own album (though he could apparently play the piano aged 4), Muzik, released in 2017. His synthesizer soundscapes are cathedral-like with deep organs, improvised tinkering pianos and the odd fire alarm – I rather like it. The cover photo, above, is by Alec Soth, who seems to be everywhere nowadays.

A few years ago Wolfgang Tillmans was riding the crest of Frank Ocean's, erm, wave when Tillmans' song Device Control was used on Ocean's 'visual' album, Endless, and his frank photo of Frank used for the cover of his Blond(e) album (just about everyone's favourite album of the decade). Tillmans had always photographed music – gigs and bands, and occasionally Djayed – and tinkered with making music before he even owned a camera, but it's only recently he's released various EPs. His music is described as a mixture of synth, trance and house, with Tillmans also providing vocals.

David Lynch could have been talking about Eggleston's photography when he refers to his friend's album, Muzik, as 'music of wild joy with freedom and bright, vivid colours'. Lynch has often dabbled in music, from the Eraserhead soundtrack with Alan Splet, influencing a generation of industrial music; to writing the lyrics to Julee Cruise's dreamy first album, Floating into the Night; and finally releasing his collaboration with Angelo Badalamenti, Thought Gang, in 2018, originally recorded in the early 1990s. He has also released three albums under his own name; they're kinda like Lynch and his films – weird, compelling, a bit retro. His cover of Bob Dylan's The Ballad of Hollis Brown is, well, it's why Mel Brooks called Lynch 'Jimmy Stewart from Mars'.

It's hard to know where to start with Alejandro Jodorowsky. On the Finders Keepers website, who reissued some of the soundtracks to his films on vinyl, they describe them as a mix of 'free jazz, Mexican acid folk, symphonic psych rock, Swedish prog, spiritual jazz, lush Morriconesque scores, analogue electronics and West African percussion'. So there you go. No need for anyone to give up their day or night job.

Previously on Barnflakes
Notes on being me
Top ten photographers
Death of the Polymath
Absolutely famous
Don't give up the day job
Sherman and Sherman

Community Reflections Private View

The catchily-titled Community Reflections on Health and Wellbeing Through Smartphone Photography (no, not a contradiction) has actually been a great and fun photography course I've been attending for the past few months, visiting a church, Art Deco swimming pool, woods, mine and, best of all, Feadon Farm animal sanctuary, where I got weed on by a squirrel, whacked on the arm by an angry owl's wing and kissed three times on the nose by a fox. These things don't happen to me every day. Our group is having a private view on Wednesday 12th June at Heartlands in Pool, after which the exhibition is on until Saturday 7th July, so plenty of time to visit.

Previously on Barnflakes:
Beauty and the Brutalist exhibition
Beauty and the Brutalist private view

Notes on being me

Several years ago I went to an interview of photographer William Eggleston. After the interview I thought he would sign books. I’d bought along his classic 1976 William Eggleston’s Guide and made my way down to the stage, along with several others. At the last second he wasn’t feeling well and didn’t sign any. However, he had done a signing a day or two before, and my friend R had got four of his books signed. I was mildly frustrated and, naturally, it stayed with me.

R contacted me early last week to let me know Eggleston was doing another book signing at the end of the week in London. Here I was, in Cornwall, with all my books in London at my parents, including two by William Eggleston. There was only one option – ask the parents. My dad kindly agreed to go and get a book signed for me. Except he didn't know where my Eggleston books were – and neither did I. He looked and found The Democratic Forest. Great, but not the one I wanted signed. I wanted William Eggleston's Guide signed. Dad couldn't find it. Mum couldn't find it. They sent me photos of my piles of books. I couldn't see it either. I let it go. Dad got The Democratic Forest signed. I was happy.

That was William Eggleston. Next was Bob Dylan.

Saturday was Record Store Day. Getting mugs to queue up all night outside record shops to buy already-released records you'd normally only spend a pound or two on in a charity shop – A-ha, Queen, Elton John, Abba etc – but producing them in limited numbers on – say – pink or yellow or red vinyl and then charging £30 for said records, well, it's genius from a marketing perspective and record companies surely can't believe they're raking in money from what was a dead market – not just vinyl but all removable media (just wait for CD Store Day and VHS Store Day – there's already a Cassette Store Day) – until a few years ago. (I'm being slightly ungracious – RSD often features exclusive live albums or alternate versions of classic albums and has helped spearhead the vinyl revival, but a lot of RSD is re-releasing crappy old albums with the dubious distinction of being "the first vinyl release since the last one". And picture discs.)

Well, guess what? I'm one of the mugs. Not content with owning Bob Dylan's classic Blood on the Tracks album on vinyl and CD, as well as the recent More Blood, More Tracks, the 6 CD Deluxe Edition of the Bootleg Series, Record Store Day was releasing the Original Test Pressing for the very first time (naturally I already own it on a bootleg mp3 – oh, and on cassette) which I was rather keen on (Variety called it the 'holy grail' of RSD releases). To be fair, I've never bought a single record from Record Store Day before (unless it's almost a year after the previous RSD and a record shop is selling their unsold stock half price – which happened with Heart of the Congos, the Lee 'Scratch' Perry mix from the 2017 RSD, which I got for £10 some time in 2018, despite it going for circa. £150 on eBay).

I thought I had it sorted. I'd asked my ex to get it from her local, excellent (despite, in the past, staff not being exactly knowledgeable about music) record shop in a small town in Wiltshire – all she'd have to do was walk down the road to buy the record for me. Turned out she was off to Paris that weekend. I asked her to change her flight (no lie); she wouldn't budge.

Why couldn't I go and buy a copy myself, I hear you cry. Well, I could but it would take me an hour to get to any record shop in Cornwall. I went to Falmouth on Friday to a participating cafe/record shop, Jam, and asked if I could buy a copy a day before as I wouldn't be able to make it there in time on the Saturday. The owner looked at me as if I'd blasphemed in church. It goes against everything RSD stands for, she told me, in no uncertain terms. I asked her how many copies of the record she had. Four, and they'd go immediately, she said. Cost? £25.

She did mention that Drift in Totnes would probably have a lot more copies. Then a lightbulb went off in my dim brain: my brother lives there. Which I told the woman. Ah well then, sorted, she said, you don't even have to get out of bed early, but your brother does. Getting him to do that might be difficult, I quipped: he has a new girlfriend. Ah, said the woman.

Anyway, it was a possibility. I texted him. He was on holiday too, but on his way back Saturday afternoon. I told him I was off to the Truro record shop first thing in the morning to get it, and I'd let him know. By 9am Saturday morning I am standing at the end of a queue thirty deep in Truro's Pannier Market, which is where Music Nostalgia is. The man in front of me is after the alternate mix of A-ha's debut album, Hunting High and Low. Which he gets. I do not get the Dylan. Sold out instantly, the owner tells me.

I tell my brother. He's almost in Exeter. He asks me if there's a record shop there. Of course! Rooster Records, been there a few times. He 'rushes' (after having a coffee first) to Rooster Records – they've sold out too. He phones Drift – they have copies left – and asks if he can reserve one. He's told no. I phone Drift and ask if I can reserve a copy for my brother to pick up. I'm told no, in no uncertain terms: you have to be there in person to buy the record. They have a 'pinch' of the records left. I tell brother to leg it there. After Exeter charity shops, lunch and more coffee and a late train he is in Totnes by late afternoon.

Whilst brother was running around South West England record shops, what was I doing? Having a leisurely stroll around Tregothnan House, which has the largest historic garden in Cornwall, and now contains Britain's first tea plantation, producing tea to buy in the shop which reportedly contains only 15% Cornish tea and works out costing about 50p a tea bag. Tregothnan House and gardens has been owned by the Boscawen family since the 1300s. They also own – and holiday-let to rich Londoners – property all over Cornwall. Aside from a brief ransack during the English Civil War (1642–1651), the estate has remained untouched. It beggars belief why this country hasn't had a proper revolution. Anyway, lovely garden and it was only £10 on the charity open weekend (otherwise it's £65 for a private garden visit). Then we went to Merther to see its abandoned church. It has no roof and a forest growing inside it. The squirrels and ravens were surprised to see me.

Meanwhile brother is speeding up his pace in Totnes. Then, with the shop in sight, he thinks about running and imagines having to wrestle the last copy from the hands of the punk who'd just bought it, drag him outside and 'do a De Niro on him' (his words).

Luckily time was on his side and after all the pseudo rush the shop still had half a dozen copies left after my bro bought one for me. I don't know when I'm going to see it or play it, but I've got it. The Eggleston and the Dylan – couldn't have done them without a lot of family help. Much love and appreciation.

• William Eggleston, 2¼ exhibition at David Zwirner
• Bob Dylan's Blood On The Tracks Test Pressing, Record Store Day Edition, Reviewed

Previously on Barnflakes:
Top ten records I would have bought in Totnes if I had any money
South London record shops
Weekend Barngains 
Top ten photographers

A brief history of photography (part three)

Back in the day when we had to take our photos to Boots to get developed, the only time we ever used to share photos was boring to death family and friends with our holiday snaps (like with a joint, you didn't want to share them with just anyone). Now we do it to strangers too on social media of course. I'm such a Luddite, if I want to see some good photos, I'll look in a photography book or visit an exhibition where hopefully the photos are larger than 3x3 inches. My eyes are fading too.

Previously on Barnflakes:
A brief history of photography (part two)
A brief history of photography (part one)

Flickagram #1

I've made my dislike of Instagram – what Constant Dullaart calls “an appreciation system based on popularity over quality, and social skills over talent” (in other words, life, right?) – known in these pages (like here, here and here). Even so, I quite like the square photo format, so I'm publishing them here instead, where I won't be bothered by a lack of likes. More to the point, it's a bit of visual filler in between my sometimes infrequent post writing.

Previously on Barnflakes:
Barnflakes on Instagram
Notes on...
Top ten most boring Instagram subjects
Photo opportunity 

Elsewhere on Barnflakes:
Instagram
Flickr

Elsewhere on the web:
What next for photography in the age of Instagram? in the Guardian.

Beware the Gulls

I haven't really been doing any writing since moving down to Kernow, but been drawing a lot with pen and ink, and taking many photos – some of which are on Flickr, a few are on Instagram.