Little thoughts…

3rd April 2014

This week is a slightly delayed entry but depending on my various clocks and watches I may have actually made a Thursday post. (I purposely set all of my clocks to different variants of future time to teach/prevent me from being late…. it doesn’t work.)

Tonight was the Labyrinth (4 years in development opening) as ever it was great fun and reminds me how blessed we are to have a hub that unites image-makers in social context. Hanging out at the lab has always been a way of meeting like-minded folk and sharing tales. My father is a photographer so I was lucky enough to grow up tipping the trays in the darkroom shed ladden with dense dev fumes. I recall frequently sitting on a stool watching Tom & Jerry on the TV covered with a red filter whilst my dad kept one eye on his watch. The magic of the image slowly appearing always amazed me and felt like a fun game. The romantic nostalgia I have towards the craft has never ceased and actually grows the more I learn.

 

 

These images are a process I am still playing with. Using Polaroid is such a different way of seeing and I treated them as sketchbook diary entries during my trip. They were an instant way of recording the day’s adventures without putting too much emphasis on the visions I had of how I wanted /want to rewrite the folk tale. They are simply a record of my encounters and there to tie together my thoughts and experiences as I untangle how I want the project to progress.

These two images are from different days. The second is from a museum in a small village in Maramures. It is tradition for families to place a red pot on the top branch of a tree or doorframe when there is a single women looking to wed living at the residence. Like a peacock flashing it’s feathers this indicates for any prospective bachelors to take note. This museum’s tree takes the tradition to an extreme.

Do check out the great show at Labyrinth,https://www.labyrinthphotographic.co.uk/a-year-in-development/ I highly recommend… as well as one of my favorite artists currently showing at Flowers London (Esther Teichmann – https://www.estherteichmann.com/) the book is well worth the pennies

OAO x