mrscomophotography

Monday, June 02, 2008

Notes before a large post 3 (Douglas)

As mentioned in my previous post, Douglas has appeared on these pages before. Now a good friend as well as a fascinating subject photographically and photo journalistically, Douglas went from being an active and outspoken Englishman with a busy job and social life into a partially paralysed, partially brain-damaged invalid after suffering a massive stroke whilst driving home one evening in October 2004. Douglas describes himself as a disabled Englishman living in Greece, but on closer inspection he’s much more than that. Time meant that I simply couldn’t get the pictures I wanted of Douglas (physiotherapy, art class, sailing etc), and the pictures I have of him, including an extraordinary sequence where he tries (and fails) to organise his medicine for the next seven days cut together (in my mind and camera, but never as far as in an edited piece of work) with pieces of rusting furniture in his garden are all that I’ve got to show (currently residing as a series of contact sheets on Flickr here).

Notes before a large post 2 (Dodo & Petra)

As well as creating individual photo essay pieces for my Easter assignment that focused on one (or in this case, two) characters, I also started experimenting with overlapping characters. The work I started doing with Dodo and Petra, the German lesbian couple, incorporated, through them talking about their friends in Greece, Douglas and Allanah, who appeared in my Relationships assignment and, as Douglas, as an Easter assignment character (see the post to come after this one). As I was in the middle of layout on a publishing project at the time, the Dodo & Petra piece wound up as a magazine-looking piece (albeit a ridiculously bad an unfinished one). This piece was the closest I cam to actually finishing an assignment.

Notes before a large post 1 (Alex)

Edited and unfinished photographs from my Easter assignment with Alex (see below). I was interested in doing a series of essays on people living in Greece who were born somewhere else, and how their backgrounds affected their relationships with their adopted countries. I threw in a few wild cards too, such as a pair of German lesbians and a formerly frenetic Englishman who had a seriously debilitating stroke in Greece four years ago and who is now cared for by his wife. Work commitments among other issues (see today’s lengthy blog when I finally post it later in the day) meant that the project has been mothballed. I’m putting this information up to show that I have at least been working on the projects! Alex is 17 and was born in the UK. He moved to Greece when he was four. The day I first met him, as he sat at a kitchen table swinging his kompoloi (Greek Orthodox worry beads), I asked him if he felt British or Greek. He told me he was 100% Greek. This is interesting as his younger brother, 14-year-old Joey, left the UK when he was a tiny baby and yet feels entirely British. The pictures here were the final few that were to be edited down to four or five to go with some text that I never got from Alex. My fault entirely.