The Story of Roundabout

In my work, I try to express emotion through my landscape photography, and I bear in mind questions about whether work should have an objective theme, or whether it can be purely personal.

Roundabout is intended to be a visual explanation of my emotional state whilst considering my ongoing frustrations regarding freedom to access green spaces, trespassing and the urban environment, particularly the impact of traffic.

It is a response to a minor car accident, back pain, a difficult relationship, weeks of flu and the anxiety that traps me close to home. The fire that propelled me to travel (or was it escape?) has diminished, quelled by the responsibility I have for my children and my home.  It has rooted me to the spot, made me weak and sometimes confines me to my bed. Things scare me. Really scare me.

I have learnt to reliably move my body in beneficial ways. As Lee Hazlewood sang "I've learned to do some simple things. Like lock the door and shut the lights". I wake the kids, clean the kitchen, make some food, shop online. Activities are safe: out with friends, visiting cities, using public transport.  The result is that the wildernesses I love are largely out of bounds.I pick up a camera or two and explore close to home, almost a genre of landscape photography itself[1].

I seek out the pockets of green overlooked by industry, where traffic rages metres away or buzzes continuously on the periphery. I try to suspend reality, to enjoy this faint taste of freedom. But the land is spoilt, it's inadequate, damaged and poisoned. It reflects me.I want to stretch my legs, to walk for miles without hitting towns, to hear the silence and feel my heart settle. Is it healthy to live like this?  I don't think so.

Installation at De Montfort University

It's been documented that nature is beneficial to those suffering from depression.  “Controlling for individual and regional covariates, we found that, on average, individuals have both lower mental distress and higher well-being when living in urban areas with more green space.” [2]

However, a UK study finds differently “after adjustment for confounding by respondent socio-demographic characteristics and urban/rural location, the association was attenuated to the null”.[3]   The report goes on to say “While we did not find a statistically significant association between the amount of green space in residents’ local areas and mental wellbeing, further research is needed to understand whether other features of green space, such as accessibility, aesthetics or use, are important for mental wellbeing.” I find this is revealing.

Looking around my mostly urban area, there are city parks, verges and further out, fields and a few country parks (of the pay your parking fee, be gone by dusk variety). I appreciate these but they are structured, small pockets of shared space in which we are ‘allowed’ to visit if we have a car and the fee. In addition to this, many ‘green’ areas are simply there because the land has no value for further development. The term ‘Edgelands’ was conceived in 2002 by Marion Shoard to describe “The interfacial interzone between urban and rural”. It is not necessarily a new concept, as a hundred and fifty years earlier Victor Hugo gloriously declared these areas "bastard countryside...ugly but bizarre, made up of two different natures".

These areas hold an unconventional attraction. This is my environment. The work I’m making is borne of this. My photographs show the damage inherent in these zones but include an element of hope as nature pokes through the poisoned ground. It’s a metaphor for how I feel, how I adapt, how I compromise within my surroundings and yet hope to grow.

Image from East Meet West Publication, 2020

References

1 Irvine, John (2015) A Path Not Far... Landscape Editions Volume One www.kozubooks.com

2 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23613211 Psychol Sci. 2013 Jun 24 Would you be happier living in a greener urban area? A fixed-effects analysis of panel data. White MP1, Alcock I, Wheeler BW, Depledge MH.

3 https://www.understandingsociety.ac.uk/research/publications/524371 BMC Public Health, June 1, 2017 A cross-sectional analysis of green space prevalence and mental wellbeing in England Victoria Houlden, Scott Weich and Stephen Jarvis

Teenage Werewolves: NOT landscape photographY

Taking photos of gigs isn't something I do every time I'm out. It's fun but there's always a photographer more confidently doing their stuff. These creatures take many forms (hello Ollie, it's always nice to see you in your ear defenders) but this time it was a giant of a man stood slap bang in front of me, so the first few shots are worked around him until he moved to one side for a while. Yeah, I should have moved forward alongside him, but it takes some guts to do that and I felt a bit quiet at first. Besides, I was there to see the gig primarily.

So, this is a tribute band. Yeah, that’s unavoidably just a little bit cheesy at best. Yeah, it felt daft getting dressed up to go to the spit and sawdust Musician pub on a Tuesday evening, but this was Teenage Werewolves, the prime Cramps covers band, and it would be fun.

It was one hell of a show. A generously packed set with no support. In the absence of Lux Interior, Jack Atlantis performed the ass off performing. Attempting to catch Atlantis still enough to photograph in low light was as hard as trying to photography a hen without blur. He must have covered a couple of miles and even some altitude on the tiny Musician stage. It's not a feat that will be matched any time soon.

We danced, we sang, things got covered in beer, I got a damn hard wallop in the back from a particularly inebriated bloke but that's the price of being small and at the front of a gig (it really shouldn’t be this way but I won't get scared away - it's my space too). Loads of Cramps gems were covered, plus covers of Teenage Kicks, Teen Spirit and a Clash cover which was even good by my Clash hating standards!

They call it progress

 “When we destroy something created by man, we call it vandalism. When we destroy something created by nature, we call it progress.” -Ed Begley Jr.

Nope, I've no idea who Ed Begley Jr. is.  An American actor, says Wikipedia, but I liked the words in relation to these photographs of the local railway sheds.  Clearly, the scene has been 'created by man' (I've never seen a woman working in the sheds - they seem to be assigned to period dress and tea duty only in this microcosm), though I'd argue that it was nature enough.  Every time I visit the Great Central Railway, it's not the trains that fascinate me, it's this area of ramshackle storage containers full of useful odds and ends that eventually become restored engines.  Every time I'm allowed to wander through the sheds, smell the oil and peep at the work in progress, the tools and the workbenches I appreciate the access...and the people working there wonder why I'm taking photos.  "We had some students in here once taking photos..." they'll say, totally unaware of how special this unpretentious environment is.

I took these photos a nearly two years ago and since then I've had little time to devote to such things.  I haven't now.  I want to be studying but I'm cleaning the house ahead of Christmas, which is long overdue and hindered by a back that needs to be a little stronger for such things. Still, I'm making progress in my microcosm, though it's influenced by what I think a house should appear to be, criticisms from family and ideas about home style (mostly ignored) rather than simply providing a safe, warm environment for my family and friends. Tools and guitars will be moved, offcuts of wire and piles of sawdust eradicated, albeit temporarily. My own clutter will be tamed. Still, until tarpaulin chic is fashionable, it's probably for the best.

52 Rolls:21 Denmark. Holga Meg Diana+

My family is very varied.  Some folk never venture far from home.  Others decide that they’re going to get as far away from it as possible.  I was talking to perhaps the most wayward member of my family in my Grandma’s flat one afternoon when I said “Well, next time you’re in Europe, give me a yell and I’ll hop on a plane”.  And she yelled.  And I did.

So it came to pass that after a hastily rejigged departure following a flight cancellation, I left the newly bolted together house mamil still sweating off post operative drugs in the care of my laziest youngest offspring, and got into a cab, caught a train to Luton, an airport bus, a plane to Denmark (the Teenagers’s first flight and only my third), took the Metro into Copenhagen, and another train out to Odense.  Heather was located at the top of an elevator, and we all got on the bus to her digs.

The main aim was to catch up with digital photos – so there’s only one from Odense here.  The whole country is so utterly tidy and there are safe cycle lanes right out into the middle of nowhere.  And they’re not kidding when they say it’s flat.  Seriously, even I can ride a bike there for miles and miles.  You’ve got to be a maniac to ride one in the UK in comparison.  I did when I got back – that’s been filed under Not Fun.

This flat, well kept country was potentially quite uninteresting for me as I like the slightly messier asides – but with the help of the Uni staff we did find some run down areas.  However, this was spotted by my son just metres from Heather’s extremely pleasant Ikea infested digs.  We spent a lovely time in the drizzle with the wild horses getting this snap.

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After three days it was time to let Heather do some work and for her partner, Mark, to head off on even wilder travels with the tiniest lightest camping kit ever, so we headed to Copenhagen for a day and a bit, staying with a 20-something over tall volleyball enthusiast named Rasmus, who rented out a painfully cool room on Air BnB.  We wandered out on the first day to explore…you’ll notice from the overlapped photos that the Holga was set to the wrong exposure option.  16, rather than 12.  I suspect Teenager involvement (I borrowed his Holga later and it was set wrong), but I don’t have a film mask for this camera so I guess it doesn’t really matter.

The second day was spent in the National Museum of Photography, the Design Museum, and the National Gallery of Denmark so there wasn’t much time for photos.  Besides, the Teenager’s patience was stretched enough as it was by the time we hit the modern art that he staged a sit in (I may have left him in front of one of the more out-there exhibits on purpose) and I had to call in an emergency all you can eat buffet stop at Riz Raz.  He was a bit rancid during the refuelling process but we survived.

We both really liked Denmark, despite us still coming quite seriously unstuck with two cancelled trains along the way and we were rather naffed off to be back in the UK.  But we headed out to the ‘the pits’ for a wander soon afterwards – well, we needed to finish the film, catch pokemon and eat ice cream.  I think we’ve adapted again now to our comparatively under funded over populated environment.  It’s a lot less relaxing, bit infinitely more varied.

And we’re planning our next trip. California/Nevada/Utah, I’m told…2019. I hope we do it.

Technical shit:

I really have very little idea.  It was ages ago.  Bear with me!  I know I used Digibase C-41 Ready to use pre diluted softpacks.  The temp was 25 as it was such a hot weekend and after I following the 21 temp instructions earlier in the day I followed the instructions for the 25 temp…but I’m not sure it was the best idea.  Another film in the same canister was less than impressive – but it was probably just way too out of date.

Olympus XA2 at the beach

Jacqui Booth / August 20, 2016

Well, there’s been a little gap (which has since grown into a very big gap) as life got in the way.  Predictably, the house mamil rather inconsiderately threw himself off his bike one Sunday evening and is still is recovery.  I’ve heard more ‘ows’ than you can shake a stick at in the last few weeks.  It’s been…interesting.  I also went to Odense and Copenhagen in Denmark using public transport from door to door, which was an experience.  Shortly afterwards I took my driving test.

So, this is from a time gone by, when the house mamil was away cycling to Paris and my eldest was traipsing around the Derbyshire countryside with an extremely large backpack.  My sister and I decided that it was a really good idea to go away with a baby and my youngest (it was, actually) so off we went in her campervan to Hunstanton.  I stayed with the boychild in a tiny floral-ish tent that smelt faintly of curry.  I’d diss the previous occupants but they were brave enough to take a floral tent to a biker festival, which I gather attracted a few comments, so I’ll leave them be.

I think my naughtly little sister (to give her her full title) may have become faintly pissed off with me taking pictures and filling her van with sand, because we’ve not been away since…

Or it could have been when I left her in the van for the ‘short walk’ I took from Old Hunstanton to ‘New’ Hunstanton that took a little longer than anticipated and took in the local suicide spots, then an ill chosen sprint back along the beach.  Of course, you can’t sprint on sand – and there were photos to do.

Or maybe it was that she couldn’t move even into the middle distance without me taking a photo of her holding her baby…

Or perhaps it was my unwisely chosen dungaree shorts.  I started out with a sensible pair of thick tights…but it degenerated badly.  I pulled them into some sort of decent state for the photo but it will forever be THAT weekend with the shorts.

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Ah well. We survived!

AND she must have forgotten about it as we’re going away again soon (don’t show her this).

Obligatory film using up shots, back at my fave shortcut in Leicester:

Developed in the kitchen using Digibase C-41 Ready to use pre diluted softpacks.  The temp was 25 as it was such a hot weekend but I followed the 21 temp instructions…which in retrospect was lucky, I think.