MAGNUM

For my work placement I have contacted every living Magnum photographer that lives in the UK. Except Martin Parr of course. Ian Berry is the only one to have gotten back to me. I'm not going to be able to work with him, but looking for a placement has forced me to look deep into his body of work and I've found it really interesting.

Placement Research

Even though I haven't secured a placement yet, I have enjoyed doing the research because it has introduced me to a lot of new photographers. Some favorites include Maurice Heesen, Meredith Andrews, Nurit Yarden and John Baxter.

Another week, another WI meeting.

At this weeks meetings, I listened to a two hour talk on lace and also a presentation on how to get divorced. Fun stuff.

I wasn't happy with the lighting in the portraits I had taken last week using the metz flash,

so I booked out a broncolor location lighting kit with a softbox. I set everything up at the first meeting, then realised I didn't have a hotshoe adapter so I couldn't connect the flash to my camera. I booked one out for the second meeting but the head was broken dumped every time it loaded. I didn't get to take any more portraits.

The WI

Simultaneously to my Gaia project, I have been working on one about community. I originally wanted to do a Donovan Wylie style project on travellers and gypsies, but they were against me photographing them unless I was going to live with them for a while. I would love to do that one day but I had a deadline for this project and there is no way I would be able to complete it in time. I made the decision to go in a completely different direction and photograph the Women's Institute. I was interested in whether they would live up to the stereotype of women in their late 70's and 80's drinking tea, eating cake and knitting tea cozies. I also thought they would be more cooperative and easier to photograph. I wasted quite a lot of time waiting for the Dorset Federation to get back to me about which meetings I could attend, so just decided to turn up to a few. This week I went to Throop and Highcliffe.

The Last Mud Horse Fisherman

After my disappointment with the nuclear power station, I racked my brain and exercised my research skills and found an excellent story. I knew of a man who fished with a mud horse on the mud flats near the power station and thought this would relate to Gaia well but I wasn't sure what the documentary would be about. I found an article about him and it turns out that he is the last mud horse fisherman in the world. There used to be hundreds but now he's the only one left, which is sad, but great for me because now I have a documentary story! I went to visit him and do a shoot and he told me that the power plant is planning for an extension, and if they get it he won't be able to fish shrimp anymore. At the moment they are working side by side but our need for electricity is wiping out an ancient tradition.

Gaia, druids, goddesses and nuclear power.

I've been working on a project about the Gaia theory far the last few weeks. Not wanting to take the fashion route like so many other people, I set about making a documentary. I spent some time in Glastonbury hanging out with druids and researching goddesses but that was just for fun really. I can't make a documentary about goddesses after all! After buying James Lovelock's book The Revenge of Gaia I decided to focus on nuclear power, as Lovelock says that is the future. I've spent this week trying to get access to Hinkley point nuclear power station and eventually being escorted off the premises. Because of the post 9/11 anti-terrorist movement, the security guards there aren't even allowed camera phones!

Week 15 - A New Book.

I have to admit I am a bit of a geek when it comes to photography books, and when I saw Don McCullin's Shaped by War on the shelf in the bookshop, I didn't think twice about spending a week's food money on it. Shaped by War presents the narrative of McCullin's life, a collection of photos of McCullin in the field as well as the key photographs from his career. There is an emphasis on the presentation of previously unpublished material and some rare colour work which is strange as I've only ever seen him using black and white.

I went to a Don McCullin exhibition a few months ago but it was just his new work, since he's retreated to Somerset to photograph the landscape surrounding his home. Even though landscape photography usually bores the pants off of me, the dark and dramatic skies in his high contrast images are hauntingly reminiscent of war and a saddening incite into how he has been affected by what he has seen.