Driving

Trawling 4

Walking

Walking

Trawling 3

That sinking feeling

Don’t ask me how or why but yesterday I promised to buy my friend Frances a ladder. I bought it this morning and delivered it to her house this afternoon, and, not content with buying and delivering a ladder when I’ve already got more work than you can shake a stick at I then offered to deliver a carload of plastic bags full of carpets to her husband Andrew. Andrew owns two yachts and makes a living chartering them during the summer around the Greek islands. Both of his yachts are in dry dock for the winter along with about 30 others, awaiting among more important things such as new engines, propellers and the like several plastic bags full of carpets. Looking suspiciously like the man from a certain television advertisement for fish fingers from my youth, Andrew’s perfect portrait material, and so I thought I’d have a go this afternoon. There’s much excitement at the moment down at the dry dock as the Volos Port Authority have brought in their huge yellow crane used to lift all the yachts into the water over the next few days. At least that’s the theory. What actually happens is that because the yachts are docked two or three deep, the crane has to lift the yachts in from the harbour end back. If one of the yachts is behind schedule and in front of a yacht that ready to go in the water the latter yacht simply doesn’t go anywhere. This is the case for the yacht pictured here, which is causing Andrew and a few other yacht owners endless misery. I liked the idea of doing a series of informal portraits of Andrew using the damaged hull of the offending ship as a background, offering both a sense of irony to the photograph as well as a pleasing frame for his head. Of Scottish heritage, Andrew spent his childhood in Japan, toured internationally as a professional drummer with several semi-famous bands in the 1970s and now splits his life between London and Greece. On my first list of possible subjects for my so-called Semi-Greeks assignments, Andrews is about as focused as Mr Magoo, so I’ll make do with these portraits and be done with him. Every cloud has a silver lining however, and on Saturday night Andrew showed up at a party with a big piece of halva made in a small local factory. This is the real stuff, far surpassing any halva you’ll find in a shop, and, when I can get him focused enough, Andrew’s going to show me where the factory is so I can approach them with an idea for an extended photo essay based on a day in the life of one of its workers. No idea whether this will happen, but no point in despairing either. My smaller picture stories are mostly planned now, and I’ve got a pretty exact idea of what I want to get from all of them, including putting into practice a more creative use of lighting that I’ve used so far. Watch this space as always!

Trawling 2

Trawling 1