The Sandwich Tin of Mystery.

There's a quality to old photographs that's so sentimental and romantic - especially if they are not your own. I found an old sandwich tin full of photos ranging from 1940 to the 1980's at a car-boot sale last weekend. I think the fact you don't already link the pictures to familiar mundanaties of everyday life ("oh, that's just another one of Grandad's picnics") means you immediately get some sense of romance and mystery - the photo above is a great example. Where are they? Why are they there? When was the last time you actually wandered across the tarmac with your suitcase - it must have been taken some time ago. Were they rich? Even famous? Perhaps they're on their honeymoon. Perhaps they robbed a bank the day before.

See the more of the photos here.

Patrick Wolf

I'm listening to this a LOT at the moment. It's great. The songs, the lyrics, the art direction, everything is beautiful. Lovely, vibrant, passionate and thoughtful. So to sum up, it's quite good.

patrickwolf.com
on myspace
on lastfm

William Lanson

William Lanson's photography feels huge, vast and epic. His self portraits are paticularly great - initially a side-project, they are both funny and sincere, alluding to a humour that bubbles away under the surface. They also give a sense of scale to the landscape, and the act of covering his face, for me, means you can read a multitude of narratives into every picture and adds a bit of a sinister edge.

In September of 2004, while I was driving around America working on a project called Encounter, I began photographing myself in the landscape as a means of activating the photographic process when no other subjects presented themselves... ...I went from being an observer.. to a photographic collaborator, physically engaging with the landscape as a form of creative play. ...Although this project began as an exercise, the playfulness, experimentation and sense of humor that emerged from it has come to represent the new way that I approach my work.



Photographs blatantly with no permission at all, copyright William Lamson;

FLIGHT No4 7/21/2004
ME IN AMERICA
Polson, Montana
Warner, Oklahoma
Loxley, Alabama

William Lamson
via fiticola

I'm From Barcelona and I have balloons

I'm From Barcelona played a fantastic gig at Koko the other night - possibly the most cheerful, happiest, least pretentious gig I've ever been to. There were balloons! confetti! kazoos! It was great. This much I was, in the far hopeful reaches of my mind, expecting – but there were also some lovely surprises;

- a stagedive in the first song
- a bit of a moshpit (albeit a friendly cuddly one – a new experience in itself)
- a Bryan Adams cover
- a partial Like A Prayer cover
- a fairly heavy rock band playing support (?!)
- a happy song about chicken-pox
- and what can only be described as a 'new rave' ending (although just using that phrase makes me feel too Nathan Barley to be comfortable) by Adventure Kid, doing a chip-tune-type cover of We're From Barcelona.

Also supporting were Connan and the Mockasins (sounded interesting, very unusual. With a proper stand-up bass! A described them as being like "a bag of chihuahuas" which is pretty apt) and Paris Motel who are always good but were particularly great - they played some wonderful new songs. Their 071 E.P. is one of my favourites but I really can't wait for the new album, a little bird tells me it's lovely.

My previous I'm From Barcelona post, with a lovely yellow & grey video.

Martin Parr

London Independant Photography hosted a talk by Martin Parr the other night.

I'd seen most of the photographs he showed before but it was interesting to hear him talk about why and how he does certain things. It would be so great to get to that point in your career where you can go around the world photographing whatever you want to, and then Magnum pays you for it.

There was a 'questions' bit at the end which was a bit weird, it seemed to be mostly either photography students saying things like "don't people get mad at you?!" or "what flash do you use?", or a few other people would raise their hand and then launch into this massive review of his life's work, summing up with "you're early stuff was much better" which just left him to go "err, ok". He seems like he is quite used to being very defensive, which was not entirely surprising but I felt stopped him from going very deep in his answers. Still very interesting though. It's unusual to find an artist with a sense of humour!

He also talked about how overlooked non-commercial photography is in Britain, and how that is (slowly) beginning to change, particularly with a major show at the Tate this summer.

Olivier Goka

I stumbled across these on Flickr - I love this guy's work, it's all consistently fantastic. Les Humains are my favourites but
Le Bestiaire and Robotheque have the same great characterisation. See his portfolio here.

Alan Kitching at St Brides

What a nice surprise - went to St Brides type library the other night with the intention of simply mooching around the Alan Kitching exhibition, only to find he was giving another talk that night! And it was fantastic. Hearing someone talk about their work seems to bring a whole new level of detail to it, and an insight into someone else's thought process is always fascinating, I find. Truly inspirational. I didn't really get chance to sneak any pictures but there are a few here.

Kew Gardens

Even at a (fairly) mature age, having paid money to get into Kew Gardens and see plants and trees, people will always be far more fascinated with the residents than with even the wierdest plants. Just look at the goose harassment going on here.

Hot Fuzz

Fantastic.

See it! Now!

yum

mmmmm. Aren't they lovely?
I am a big geek sometimes.

Frankfurt

I didn't really get to see much of Frankfurt on my trip. Mainly just the Ibis hotel and the Messe, and a short trip into town to eat one evening. Some of the things I noticed, if you're interested in such a flying visit;
- there's a shop called 'wormland'.
- they really do eat a lot of sausages. I had thought this might be a mis-leadingly comical urban myth. but Frankfurters really do seem to like frankfurters.
- you can get a half decent cup of tea...
- but it might come with coffee cream instead of milk.
- Frankfurt airport has a proper flippy departures board. I miss the one at Waterloo.
- interior design fashion has yet to get it's evil claws into the Ibis.
- however the Italian restaurant we went to (just off the main shopping street if you're interested) was a fetching shade of blancmange pink, and complete with properly argumentative Italian waiters.
- they have proper public recycling bins everywhere.
- smoking is cool

Saw lots of interesting things at Ambiente though. Perhaps when my brain is working properly again I'll stick a few things up here.

If you're really lucky. ooo!

Typical

I'm not going to be able to make it to this talk by Alan Kitching and I'm really gutted! He's been such a huge inspiration and I'm sure it would be an amazing experience (and doesn't he look nice?!) But typically it's an evening when I have to work. rubs.
Can't wait to see the exhibition.

Photo by Celia Stothard, pinched from the St Bride site.

Alan Kitching shows significant works and shares seminal influences from his fifty-year journey from printer to printmaker, apprentice to professor, Darlington to Kennington via experimental printing in Watford and letterpress in Clerkenwell to The Typography Workshop, Printroom & Studio in London SE11.
Talk, Tuesday 13 February 2007 at 7pm; exhibition preview 5.30pm
Exhibition, Wednesday 14 February to Thursday 8 March 2007