The Longest Week

Hello dear reader. I’m writing this during a week when 20,000 troops are on standby to help deal with the coronavirus crisis. Schools have shut down and exams cancelled. Social distancing has been implemented; cafes, restaurants, pubs, clubs, gyms and bingo halls ordered to close. Supermarket shelves are being stripped clean. The worst in society are doing bad, the best are stepping up. Lockdown seems imminent. The Queen released a statement reminding us that ‘our nation’s history has been forged by people and communities coming together’ (as long as it’s no closer than two meters). Prime Minister Boris Johnson is ‘absolutely confident that we can send coronavirus packing in this country.’ The situation is serious, the situation is changing rapidly. It will have changed again by the time you read this.

The photo-industry is being decimated. It will recover but associated businesses and individuals might not. Photography shows, events and exhibitions have closed, cancelled or postponed. Camera manufacturers expect to take a big hit. Work has flatlined. The world has been reset. BC will come to mean something different. I am living my story, you have yours, I hope it’s not too terrifying. I reached out to a few to hear theirs.

“I’ve never know anything like it, the work has just dropped off, it’s like shaking a dead Christmas tree. A month of work gone in four days, upward of 15 jobs. One morning, in the space of 25 minutes, four jobs cancelled,” explains freelance photographer, Matthew Horwood from his home in Cardiff. “I’m just getting used to not having jobs to do, not having to be somewhere at 9 O’Clock - not having any work is really strange.” Matthew was staff photographer at the The Western Mail before being made redundant in 2014 and thrown into the world of PR and event photography. With no PR or event photography to do, he’s being proactive shooting news stock for Getty Images. “It’s a bit bleak to be honest, going out and shooting the same thing over and over again and having the same conversations. I am at least free to do what I want want.” He says with a chink of optimism.“I don’t think every photographer’s going to get through it without doing other jobs. It’s very bleak,” he adds. Does he expect to be able to photograph himself out of adversity? “I don’t know how long it’s going to go on for. Depends whether there’s new opportunities for pictures every day. Every photographer’s going to be doing this, there’s probably more competition than before, people who did PR and news are now just doing news. It does make it difficult.”

Fashion and celebrity photographer Jay McLaughlin has a strategy. “Everything is postponed until further notice. I had enough to pay all my bills. Now it’s like, what can I sell?” What he can sell are his books: Bailey’s Stardust, Vanity Fair 100 Years: From the Jazz Age to Our Age, his Peter Lindbergh and Mario Testino’s. “Do I need books when I have an internet of pictures, sure they’re nice to have but are they necessary?”

©Peter Dench

If Jay, is selling photo books, is anyone buying them? “Sales are going through the floor. In the last five days I haven’t sold a book online. On a normal week, 5 or 6 books a day this time of year,” says Colin Wilkinson, who founded Bluecoat Press in 1992. “2008 was the first shake up of the book publishing industry, the financial crisis along with the growth of the internet meant traditional bookshops and outlets vanished very quickly, publishers had to find new ways of selling and develop an internet presence. The problem now is people have got other priorities. He has one book potentially funded and the book, Juvenile Jazz Bands by Tish Murtha, is funded. “We hit the £10K crowdfunding target in two days, since then, in two weeks around another £1.5K, normally it would be treble. It’s quite obvious people are not spending. If in a years time we’re in a world recession, I would probably think there’s no point in continuing which is a great shame as I have six brilliant projects lined up which I really want to do.” These include books by Jim Mortram, Margaret Mitchell and Carolyn Mendelsohn.

I talk to Carolyn just after she’s rescued her eldest son from the University of Manchester party scene and is understanding about the situation at Bluecoat Press. With her three children safely back home, she’s being creative in the circumstances, making formal portraits of her daughter Poppy on the eve of her fourteenth birthday and snapping her as they walk around Asda supermarket. “My son Sam, who’s 15, is writing a journal and I’m taking simple domestic photographs. We’re going to put them together and make some kind of blog. It’s really for ourselves and I’m sure lots of people will be doing similar things.”  I hope they are and in time, can make a small but significant contribution to this extraordinary chapter of history.

Bluecoat Press

Also this week (it’s been a long week), The Church of England has restricted wedding ceremonies to five people. Does this include a photographer? I ask Lee Glasgow. “I’ve a wedding tomorrow and the registrar has said I’m not allowed in the room, only close family. I’m planning to set the camera up on a tripod and take pictures remotely from the room next door. It’s not ideal but a solution. I’ve advised the couple to hold the kiss for a second longer as the remote app is a lot slower.” Lee photographed over 50 weddings in 2019, 38 are booked for 2020 but is likely to reduce, he has taken £20K of deposits. “In the wedding industry we call them booking fees - apparently, legally, you don’t have to pay booking fees back because you’ve done an amount of work.” He’s not money grabbing, just being sensible. Lee is advising clients to call him for a conversation, keep things verbal, on a case by case basis, see what can be worked out amicably. He’s stepped in and volunteered a few hours of his time to photograph a wedding at short notice. “In wedding world, I think we’re up against it anyway because everyone’s a photographer, do weddings need a photographer, do they see the value a photographer brings? The price of quality cameras is coming down, picture quality of mobile phones is going up so the market has been shrinking for a long long time.” Lee is savvy and established and expects to be in business next year, weddings will still go ahead, just not now. Other photographers may not be so fortunate. “I know a number of photographers that want to work one day a week and left good jobs to become a wedding photographer and now realise the industry might be disappearing, they’re going to be buggered.”

©Peter Dench

It’s not just professional photographers who are in turmoil, amateur photographers and those studying it across the United Kingdom are being affected: projects have been suspended, some have collapsed. Camera clubs, many who have members in the vulnerable category for coronavirus, have temporarily closed. Harrogate Photographic Society cancelled a coach trip to Open Eye Gallery in Liverpool. Open Eye won’t miss out out on 40 plus visitors because it closed their doors to protect staff, artists and clients. Likewise The Photographers Gallery London, Side Gallery Newcastle and Anne McNeill, Director and Curator at Impressions Gallery Bradford, made the decision to close the building. “It’s really important to stress how crucial the building is to us, it’s not just four white walls, it’s a community space as well. The reason I do it is for photographers and visitors to experience photography in real life and to have a meeting place, we wouldn’t want to lose that.” Enterprising Anne, gave an impassioned message to her staff as they left to work remotely from home. ““Use this time as thinking time, we might come up with a great new idea, we might not, that doesn’t matter - work out a strategy how we can build up our virtual community and reach out to all photographers, what learning advice we can offer for free, are there any paid opportunities we can do online for photographers. Even when the building opens again, hopefully this new way of working will stay with us.”

©Peter Dench

From the gloom there always springs hope and the photography industry has sprung high. There’s a Photographers Under Quarantine Facebook Group, group video chats, free expert advise across all social media or at a knock down price with the proceeds going to charity. “Every situation is neutral, nothing is good, nothing is bad, it’s only how you feel about it that makes it good or bad - you can choose. We have forced free time, if you cannot work what can photographers do?” Ponders Jay McLaughlin, a keen reader of philosophy and influenced by Marcus Aurelius. I ask on social media what photographers can do? ‘Review hard drives, memory cards, back up important images, update websites, improve SEO, make prints, write more blogs, record vlogs, keyword stock, be kind.’

Stay safe, sane and sanitised - thanks for reading and hope to see you smiling on the other side.

A version of this article first appeared in the 11 April 2020 issue of Amateur Photographer magazine