In Conversation With Marcus Bleasdale

There is no greater love than that between two heterosexual men. The silver screen is testament to this; the eponymous Spartacus (Kirk Douglas) and Antoninus (Tony Curtis); Butch Cassidy (Paul Newman) and The Sundance Kid (Robert Redford); Joe Buck (Jon Voight) and Ratso Rizzo (Dustin Hoffman) in Midnight Cowboy; and Han Solo (Harrison Ford) and Chewbacca (Peter Mayhew) in the Star Wars franchise (assuming Chewie is a chap).

From slaves on the road to Rome, to cowboys on the run in Bolivia; from surviving on the streets of New York, to a galaxy far far away; platonic man-love flourishes. If I was to spring from the trenches across no man’s land, it would follow a man’s order to CHHHAAARGE!!!!!! If I was to pirate the seven seas, it would be as an able seaman in an all-male crew. My luxury item on the BBC Radio 4 programme, Desert Island Discs, would be a man; and that man would be Marcus Bleasdale.

I first met Bleasdale in the London offices of the Independent Photographers Group (IPG), where he was formalising his membership to the agency I had joined two years previously. I assessed the newbie; his legs a little short; his hair a little long. Bleasdale had just self-published One Hundred Years of Darkness; a photographic journey into the heart of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). I assessed the work; dark, dense, moody images, present a raw, threatening world of dark, dense, shadowy characters. Out of necessity, the photographs were often shot from the hip; often out of focus. I suggested a ‘welcome’ drink in The Fox next door. Four bottles of wine later, a bromance was born.

 © Marcus Bleasdale/VII Photo

It’s the annual family Dench winter vacation and Norway is our destination. Norway: a country where state-run liquor stores open less frequently than a nun’s nightgown; where kindergarden kids play outside in temperatures touching -14C. Norway: a country where unemployment is counted in single-figure percentages and which, according to a UN report, has the world’s highest living standards of health, education and income. I hit the tarmac tired, hung-over and broke, having maxed out on the duty-free maximum.

On the journey from Rygge's airport, Moss lufthavn, to Bleasdale’s home, I’m no longer curious why the VII Agency photojournalist chooses to live here. Arguably best known for his work with Human Rights Watch, and for his images taken in the DRC (one of the least desirable places on the planet to live according to the same UN report), the Norwegian capital could not be more different. Pushing the apartment buzzer where he lives with his wife Karin Beate (KB), I’m a little nervous. I have a new haircut and wonder if he’ll notice. Bleasdale answers in his underpants; Norwegian underpants: full-length black thermals. A student assisting him with a multimedia piece on HIV and tuberculosis cross infection in Tanzania takes our arrival as his cue to leave.

As Bleasdale excuses himself to dress and freshen up, I take the opportunity to have a nose around his office. It’s impressive; an Ian Berry print is propped on the desk; a poorly ‘fixed’ Paulo Pellegrin lies on the floor. There’s a pristine platinum American Express card and a bowl of grubby Congo currency. There’s an Olivier Rebbot award, a World Press Photo award, two, Days Japan International Photojournalism awards and a Unicef Photographer of the Year Award. I count up to 11 POY and NPPA awards before a zesty and scrubbed Bleasdale returns to take over the tour. He pulls down his prized possession: a first edition of Vietnam Inc. by his great friend and mentor, the late Phillip Jones Griffiths. He marched PJG down to 99 Judd Street in London and the premises of Photo Books International, where Bleasdale had located a copy to purchase and for PJG to sign. Randomly pulling books from the shelf, there’s a signed Cartier-Bresson and a host of signed Eugene Richards; a legacy of when the noted American photographer popped round for lunch. 

There’s an unopened copy of Don McCullin’s In England, and a copy of iWITNESS by Tom Stoddart. It’s signed: “To Marcus. Mate thanks for your support and friendship since you joined IPG. I’m proud that we are in the same team. Tom 2004.” (On return to my flat in London, I check my copy of iWITNESS. It’s signed: “To Peter. With best wishes and a reminder that it’s your turn to buy the beers! Hic. Tom 2004.”) I fit in the chair that Ron Haviv couldn’t, as Bleasdale shows me his £325, 22/50-numbered, limited-edition Magnum Contact Sheets book complete with a Renni Burri contact sheet of Ernesto 'Che' Guevara, 1963.

We take a tour of the rest of the apartment; it’s impressive. The rooms wrap themselves around a central sauna big enough to contain my ego. If you flung all the room doors open, you could run a full circle around it. I resist the urge to slap Bleasdale on the arse and shout, “You’re it!” The apartment is in the Frogner district of Oslo, Knightsbridge would be the equivalent location in London.

 © Marcus Bleasdale/VII Photo

Bleasdale plops on his timeless four-cornered hat - a recent purchase from the J.J. Hat Center on 32nd and 5th, New York - and suggests we grab the girls and pop out for pizza. Over bottles of La Raia Piemonte Barbera, with the Norwegian predilection for 1980‘s pop ballads playing in the background, he talks about his experiences in the Congo. Experiences of being kidnapped in the capital, Kinshasa, where he was dragged from his car and robbed of cash and phones by men he suspects were government soldiers. Of nearly overturning a car when escaping from direct gunfire with a dwarf polio victim being tossed around in the back; and of delivering the vehicle, riddled with AK47 bullet holes, back to it’s owner (an alcoholic priest). Of hiding in ditches from young child soldiers who should be playing hide-and-seek. And he reports on the rape; so much rape. As Gloria Estefan and Miami sound Machine's Anything For You plays, I stare out into the soft snow flakes that dust the beautiful women walking by in seal skin boots. Why would he leave? Why choose to spend half of your year travelling thousands of miles away from those who you love with the very real possibility of death (Bleasdale already has malaria). Television presenter and former pop star Ravi (Ivar Christian Johansen), interrupts to say hello and I pay the bill. It comes to £235.56. For pizza! Maybe that’s the reason he leaves.

Bleasdale grew up with a brother and sister in Brindle and Preston in Lancashire, UK. His parents split when he was 10 years old. He remained with his mother; a mother from a sibling stable of 16. Times were tough and the tough young Bleasdale often chipped in to help pay the bills with money earned from odd jobs. His part-time jazz musician father advised him against going to art school in favour of business, money and security; advice Bleasdale heeded. By the age of 30 he was being paid half a million pounds a year, owned several properties and drove a 1968 Porsche 911. He packed it all in for photojournalism. Why would he leave?

Back at the house of Bleasdale, in the company of Rioja and the music of Norwegian rock band Madrugada, he answers the question. The reason is because he is angry and the driving force behind that anger are the statistics: “More than 5.4 million already dead from conflict in the Congo since 1998; the largest death toll since World War II. Photography is a tool; a method to inform people what is going on in the country. It could be a pen or a telephone. I want things to change and the tool for me to do that is a camera”.

I ask him about a photograph that shows him sitting with four camouflaged DRC government forces. He is wearing a pink shirt. “It’s a red shirt, and I will wear anything that will distinguish me as a non- combatant”. Over the four days spent with Bleasdale he plays affectionately with Luna, his Toller breed dog. He takes my daughter Grace on long walks, he takes her sledging, he takes her ice skating; always patient, always calm, never angry. On one occasion, at the Tabernacle Bar in London, cocktail infused and bored, I suggested we have a scrap and relocated to the waste ground opposite. I punched him in the face. He had not been punched in the face since the age of 11, when Ian Wheeler wheeled his furious fists. Bleasdale calmly guided my head-locked face into a wall. We returned in good humour, to continue imbibing. In over a decade, I have never seen him angry.

Is there a future in photographing human rights abuses? There is for Bleasdale. He expects to be documenting in the DRC for another 20 years. Does he crack? There are clues. Those clues are in what he views. Bleasdale confesses to cry during episodes of CSI, Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, and the Harry Potter films, all eight of them. He loves photographer David LaChapelle, but wants to be John Stanmyer. (Bromancing behind my back!) His favourite films are Casablanca and The African Queen. His superpower would be to, “Spread love around the world.” 2012 is shaping up to be an exciting year. He will be working on a first direct commission from National Geographic magazine, it’s not in the DRC.

After a Sunday morning of skiing - well, of Bleasdale taking my daughter skiing - we do what most of Norway is doing after what most of Norway has just done: watch Lycra-clad competitors fighting it out on the slopes in skiing contests on television. His adoring and adorable wife massages his shoulders; homemade brownies are baked and nibbled. I flick through his 2010 book on the DRC, The Rape of a Nation, and assess the work. Across the black pages, bodies are taken for burial, people mourn, drunk soldiers carry weapons, money is being counted and strong men mine for gold. There are bones of the victims of violence.

© Marcus Bleasdale/VII Photo

Time spent photographing in the DRC has allowed Bleasdale’s camera to move up from the hip to focus. I stop flicking on the image captioned: "Refugees flee south after rebel attack on Bule and Fataki, north-eastern Congo, 2003." I look over at Bleasdale wiggling his toes as he sucks noisily in disgust as the French team triumph over Norway in a shoot and ski biathlon; it’s the most angry I’ve seen him. The image in the book is the only photograph of his own hanging in the mainly painting-adorned apartment. It hangs by the front door. The photograph is a metre high and two metres wide. It’s an appropriate image and an appropriate size; an image than reminds one on entering, this is the home he retreats to; a refugee from the intense horrors he has witnessed. It is also the last image one sees when leaving the apartment; an image of fleeing, of transit, of movement and change.

I don’t know where Bleasdale’s anger resides. Perhaps he leaves it festering in the DRC, to collect on return with his camera from beside the rotting corpses and rape victims; or perhaps it lives in the eyes of each child who levels their gun at him. I’m glad that Bleasdale is angry; angry enough to help fund the St. Kizito orphanage in Bunia, eastern DRC, and angry enough to keep shooting his photographs; photographs that won’t allow us to stop noticing, that show us how we can fail so spectacularly as human beings and what we must do to correct it.

It’s time to go. I squeeze the arm of this contemporary Spartacus - an arm that bears the tattoo, ‘Inner Peace’ - bid him farewell, and assuming the role of Antoninus, singer of songs, I turn home:

“Through blue shadows and purple woods...
I turn home.
I turn to the place that I was born...
to the mother who bore me and the father who taught me...
Iong ago, long ago...
Iong ago.
Alone am l now, lost and alone, in a far, wide, wandering world.
Yet still when the blazing sun hangs low...
when the wind dies away and the sea foam sleeps...
and twilight touches the wandering earth...
I turn home.”




Make a donation to the St Kizito orphanage here.

A version of this article first appeared in issue #5 of Hungry Eye magazine available to buy here.

Bleasdale's book; The Rape of a Nation - can be purchased here.

Dench's first book; England Uncensored - can be purchased here.

In Conversation With Martin Parr

I am looking at cakes. There are many cakes to choose from: coffee and walnut cake, chocolate fudge cake, lemon roll, chocolate roll, even a Colin the Caterpillar cake. I ask my wife: “Which cake do you think Martin Parr would like?” “All butter Victoria sandwich!” we say in unison, a little too loudly. Martin Parr has invited me over for tea; a Parr tea if you like. I asked my Twitter followers advice on what gift to take. Cake was the winner; well that and “Something Gaddafi”. There is no Gaddafi-shaped cake.

It is 14 years since I last made the journey to Parr’s house in Bristol, where he has been resident since 1989. I first bumped into him at Royal Ascot. He’d just shot the frame that would feature in the book Think of England, of a man in a grey top hat speaking on his mobile phone next to a red telephone box; so very Parr. Two years out of university I was finding my feet as a photographer and shuffled over to say hello. After pleasantries were exchanged, he opened his wallet, gave me his card and suggested I pop over sometime.

I check Twitter again for answers to the question: "What question should I ask Martin Parr?" The response is disappointing and some suggestions simply rude. I heave the 17-page curriculum vitae I printed from Parr’s website onto the train table and begin to read. At home, when I pressed print, I nipped to the shops for a bottle of Cava, returned home and poured myself a glass; it was still printing. I make a note to plant a tree to compensate. There is also an accompanying five-page FAQ’s which I’m determined not to ask a question from. Towards the end of the journey I’m so Parred up, I’m convinced the announcement says: “We are now arriving at Martin Parr,” rather than Bath Spa.

©Martin Parr/Magnum Photos

Martin Parr has so many visitors; a prepared ‘getting to’ memo arrived via email. The taxi driver asks: "Where to?" “Martin Parr’s house?” I reply. He looks blank, I give the address and read from the printout: “Along Cumberland and up Joy Hill.” I’m early so nip into the Adam and Eve pub for a glass of ‘Managers Choice.’ A fantastically gauche tray with a smiling woman beams across the customer, I suggest that would be something Martin Parr would like to collect. The manager does not respond.

Knock Knock. “Who’s there?” “It’s Peter Dench, author of the Dench Diary and contributing editor to Hungry Eye Magazine.” “Hello Peter, come in.” Casa Parr is busy. I exchange the all butter Victoria sandwich for a cup of tea with a Garibaldi biscuit and take a seat next to the glass display cabinet crammed with Obama objects and listen. The six-way chat swings from Shakespeare’s King Lear, artist Jack Vettriano (Parr is not a fan), to the use of ‘s’ instead of ‘z’ in the spelling of words.

With the guests dearly departed, we decide to check out his exhibition, Bristol and West at the M Shed; a collection featuring 60 images selected from the last 30 years of Parr’s career. Our plan is thwarted. His wife Susie, has the car and there is only one bike. It would have been nice to cycle down together. Heading up the darkened stairs I ask if Parr can turn on the light. The walls are an exhibitors feast, hung with great photographs by great photographers: Tony Ray-Jones, Paul Fusco, Garry Winogrand, Alec Soth, Josef Koudelka and my favourite, an August Sander. And that’s just one flight of stairs in the towering town house. (Parr doesn’t have any of his own work on the walls.) Entering his office is familiar; not much has changed since my first visit in 1997. I had sat on the floor under the enormous Chris Killip portrait of a boy on the shoulders of a man and showed him my work on posh schools. The verdict: “Not bad.”

Today I’ve been upgraded to a chair and sit tight as Parr flings an array of books my way and peppers me with information about what he’s up to. There’s the publication of an Australian book, No Worries; the publication of a book (by Contrasto) on the American city of Atlanta and summer show at the Atlanta High Museum of Art; another book on world beaches is in discussion. Commissions are generally booked up about six months in advance. There’s a project on sports in Minneapolis and an ongoing project in the Black Country. A show on the Scottish is ready to go. The next stage of his John Hinde project will be soon.

Parr is collaborating with Nazraeli Press to publish ten books of Argentinian photographers he has discovered. I flick through the sixth title in the popular series La Crieciente by Alejandro Chaskielberg, the photographs of a rural community living on the banks of the Parana Delta (river) are all taken during full moon with a combination of flash and torches. I can see why, by the third image in Chaskielberg’s folio, Parr was convinced of his inclusion in the series. Latin photographers are his current passion, a dehumidifier gently sucks away in the room where his burgeoning book collection on the continent resides. The books at my feet start to mount. I leaf through the much anticipated, The Latin American Photobook; the culmination of a four-year, cross-continental research effort led by Horatio Fernandez. The book presents 150 volumes; Parr was part of a committee of researchers. I set the book aside, which he thinks “charmingly indifferent”. He hopes the 12,000-plus collection of his books to be acquired by a UK museum or gallery.

©Martin Parr/Magnum Photos

Martin Parr gets up early to deal with internet and emails; three are inevitably from students asking for something or other. He doesn’t have an afternoon nap. He likes the odd beer or wine when it suits, but rarely during the day. He’s a big BBC Radio 4 fan and doesn’t know the brand of the clothes he is wearing. He is a nosy person and there is nothing he is not interested in, even cricket. Surprisingly, he can’t speak a foreign language. His favourite seaside town is Tenby, where he has a house. He thinks my home town of Weymouth “a great town in general”, and likes to stay on the Georgian facade that gently cradles the arcing bay. He uses a Canon 5d MKII but has never shot HD video with it. Since winning first prize at his camera club, he has never submitted work for a competition or consideration for a festival. Prizes are bestowed; inclusion in festivals requested. He never wrote a university dissertation; you didn’t have to do that sort of thing then. Martin Parr loves being a photographer and thinks it a privilege.

I take the opportunity of a lull in ratter-chatter to ask him to sign issue #1 of Hungry Eye magazine in which I wrote about my visit to New Brighton, 25 years after the town inspired his photographs for the book, The Last Resort. He signs: ‘Martin Parr was here'. I ask if I can handle his 1986 edition of The Last Resort while he signs my 1998 edition - which he does - and I ask him to sign his book Objects, which he signs: ‘To Peter, one cake = one book'. We talk about Jocelyn Bain Hogg and Marcus Bleasdale, he looks at the VII Photo Agency website for the first time and is impressed by Interrogations, by Donald Webber. Talk of internal Magnum Photos politics is off the record. He didn’t go to Philip Jones Griffiths funeral because he didn’t think it would be right. Griffiths was bitterly opposed to Parr’s membership and famously wrote a letter in which he wrote of Parr: “Let me state that I have great respect for him as the dedicated enemy of everything I believe in and, I trust, what Magnum still believes in". He refused even to speak to Parr after he was finally allowed to join.

While at the computer, I click on the link to my three-minute 19-second film on Vimeo about the War & Peace Show in Beltring, Kent. Parr chuckles; dare I say snortles. Verdict: “Not bad.” Emboldened, I click on the link to the latest Dench Diary video update where basically, my shot footage at the 59th International Ballroom Dance Championship plays along to a song about wibbly wobbly jelly sung by BBC TV Play School presenters Derek Griffiths (no relation to Philip) and Carol Chell. It seems preposterous to be stood here in Martin Parr’s office as Carol belts out: “Jelly for breakfast and jelly for tea, so wibble wobble wibble, wibble wobble wibble, wibble wobble wibble with meeeeee.” I think I detect genuine amusement and a slight wobble of the Parr noggin.

© Martin Parr/Magnum Photos

Two hours and nine minutes after arriving it is time to go, I want to go. I’ve seen more photographs in this period than I would normally in a month. My eyes throb. I find myself apologising for appearing indifferent. Parr explains how laid-back it has been and how laid-back he is in general these days. Now, I know laid-back and this is not it. One can only imagine full-throttle Parr. In fact, one doesn’t have to; it is all too evident in the work, the books, the CV and the collecting; so much collecting. His book, Objects, is not laid-back; it’s testimony to a manic collecting gene. There are Thatcher mugs plates and a spoon; Lenin and Stalin clocks; ABBA soap; Bin Laden urinal anti-splash mats. There is Spice Girl chocolate, crisp packets and body spray; a Saddam Hussein pen knife; board-games about the motorway; a Gaddafi watch; a Jesus watch; a McDonald’s watch; and trays - so many trays.

Where does the energy come from? Not the all butter Victoria sandwich that we pass unopened on the kitchen counter. Perhaps he’s more a coffee and walnut man after all. Parr calls me a cab and offers to walk me down the hill. We stop to say hello to his wife Susie, who is planting black tulip bulbs in the front garden. I wish the passionate outdoor swimmer good luck for the launch of her book, The Story of Swimming, published by Dewi Lewis. I suggest to Parr I come back in another fourteen years. “But I’ll be old then.” Exactly, then perhaps I may finally be able to keep up.

On the return train I filter what I’ve learnt through cans of Strongbow and l consider the acquired books. Instead, reach for a discarded copy of Grazia and tuck into the feature ‘What you didn’t see at fashion week'. In the morning, I click open my email and there’s one forwarded by Parr from a student at Roehampton University asking: "What is a photograph?" "What do you think the purpose of a photograph is?" and "What do you think really makes a photograph?" After two-hours and nine minutes with Martin Parr, I think I might just have an answer.

A version of this feature first appeared in issue #3 of Hungry Eye magazine available to buy here

ENGLAND UNCENSORED my first book; Advance and collectors editions now available

In Conversation With Jocelyn Bain Hogg

Jocelyn Bain Hogg (JBH) is sweating. He reaches for a small bottle of Trumper's extract of lime and depresses a cooling mist. A polka-dot Paul Smith handkerchief is flourished from the pocket of his Adam of London suit to dab the beads from his lofty brow. I sip my can of Heineken. It's touching 28C in Le Couvent des Minimes, where we both have an exhibition as part of the 23rd Visa pour l'Image (VPL) festival of photojournalism held annually in Perpignan, France. I'm representing England; JBH, Wales and Scotland. (He has never felt English, ever, and admits to sniffling with pride watching the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo.) Together we are flying the exhibitor’s flag for Britain. Waiting to be interviewed for French TV, pleasantries are exchanged in the way that British men do. Our respective journeys to this privileged position has been very different.

The Family
©Jocelyn Bain Hogg/VII Photo Agency

Solely his mother brought up JBH, an only child, after his adopted father died when he was a baby. The young JBH applied himself early to the theatrical, playing Robin Hood aged seven, and later winning the prestigious House Colours for his portrayal of Phyllis the Maid in the George Bernard Shaw farce, Passion, Poison and Pretrification, performed at the equally prestigious Lancing College (that he describes as a bear-pit). A youth of reciting Shakespeare and T.S. Eliot unravelled before unearthing his fathers old Rolleiflex persuaded JBH to turn his back on successful applications to the National Youth Theatre of Great Britain and the University of Oxford. Like many photographers before him, the Siren sounds of the click of the shutter and turn of the film winder had lured him to a lifetime behind the lens.

Five years his junior, while JBH, aged 18, was having his work published in Harpers and Queen and on the cover of the British Journal of Photography, I was still throwing chewed soggy paper to the ceiling of Mr Speedy's math class. Magnum Photos Agency photographer David Hurn, had already insulted JBH; a right of passage that would take me another 23 years. He advised JBH put his pretty pictures in a box and show them to his girlfriend. Perhaps Hurn played a hand in JBH’s unsuccessful application to Magnum. The criticism seems unabated. In 2010, at an exhibition of JBH’s project, Muse, at Third Floor Gallery in Cardiff, Hurn greeted him with the words, “Love the shirt, hate the show.”

MUSE
©Jocelyn Bain Hogg/VII Photo Agency

I first became aware of JBH attending my first VPL festival in 2002. I had a screening of my project, Drinking of England. On arrival, the talk of the town was still about the stately Brit who had entertained the crowds the previous year with photographs from his book, The Firm. First published in 2001, the work documented the criminal underworld, from exile in Tenerife to the broad spectrum of activity in the UK. Images of topless girls, gripped guns, grabbed buttocks, knuckle-duster neck chains and 6-inch cigars introduce us to the fierce world of the celebrity thug. The book has since become a cult classic. The question everyone asked was: How could this man, take these types of photographs?

The interim decade have seen our paths cross many times. We have briefly shared a commercial agent, exhibited at the same gallery, reciprocated nods across the dance floor at parties, bowed our heads at the funeral of Princess Diana and traded advice over email. Occasionally, I've been victorious competing on commissions; JBH has crushed my ambition for others. After a decade of friendly competition, a few weeks before the VPL festival we meet for a drink, to declare a truce and say, “Well done us, we are still doing it” and agree to form a coalition. I can't help thinking I've been allocated the Nick Clegg role.

Back in Le Couvent des Minimes, the television crew questions JBH; "Are you a gangster?" No. "Are you an expert on British crime?" No. “Did you constantly find yourself in danger?” No. "How does someone like you get to take these types of photographs?" The questions are understandable and the rumours are delicious. One recounts a man owed money, tired of waiting to be paid, presented the debtor with a copy of The Firm, indicating that he knew the author. The debt was immediately honoured. Another anecdote: A woman at her wits' end after the relentless bullying of her daughter at school asks if JBH’s ‘friends’ would be able to help? The bullying ceased.

I leave the French exchange and stride into JBH's exhibition. The first thing I notice is his contributor photograph, credited to fellow VII Photo Agency snapper, Seamus Murphy. A sartorially crafted JBH sits perched on a bar looking every bit the dandy, a cigarette dangles between the fingers. My contributor photograph is a self-portrait, urgently requested by the Dorset Echo, I had hauled myself out of bed hours after returning from assignment to Kirkuk, Iraq. The result is a baggy eyed, unshaven Dench, with what looks like an enormous Mohican.

The claustrophobic sweaty room suits the content of JBH’s photographs. Big men tilt their big shaven heads for whispered conversations in Knightsbridge bars. Jewels sparkle, caught in the cut-through-the-dark ring-flash. Personalities clash, the clothes are brash, men snort coke through cash. Women touch tongues and tattoos tell tales of gangs. The images are from his new project, The Family; IT IS NOT A FOLLOW UP TO THE FIRM!

The Family

©Jocelyn Bain Hogg/VII Photo Agency

The VPL press office is working us hard. In between my own dense itinerary, I try to catch up with JBH for an interview. I turn up for scheduled talks of his that he hasn't and stand alone as others are rescheduled. Journalists text me to ask if I’ve seen my British chum. We cross paths briefly in Cafe de la Poste, the unofficial festival HQ for a few grabbed words over Pastis. At one point during the week, he kicks me up the backside and I capture video footage of him calling me a w****r. The cracks in the England, Scotland-Wales coalition start to show and the sparring is welcome.

Back in London, battered but not beaten, I recoup, regroup, and head down to the home of photojournalism, the offices of Foto8 near Old Street in London. How lucky am I? The home of photojournalism, just down the road from where I live. It could have been in Nantucket; or worse, Grimsby. I'm meeting JBH at 3pm and have arrived early to look at a PDF of the The Family and chat with Foto8 director, Jon Levy. I ask the question. "How does this man take these types of photographs?" Levy explains: “It's the demeanour of JBH, he's not trying to be someone he isn’t, the bon viveur, pushy-in-a-good-way, Errol Flynn character of our day you see, is the man you get.”

JBH arrives around 4pm after a prolonged meeting with his bank manager and folds himself into a chair. The anthropologist explorer of British society explains the villains of The Family are guys who just know who they are and they don't mind being photographed; the police already know who they are. If The Family is not a follow-up to The Firm, the style certainly is. The continuation of grainy black-and-white pictures delivers the feeling of a sequel. Given the opportunity for a career in movies as a young man, JBH had opted for stills photography; his “Passport to move freely and document the world without the intervention of camera crews, set designers, bulky equipment and, above all, the necessary contrivance of film-making.” With the development of lightweight HD video cameras, would JBH now consider shooting footage? He would, but this would not have been possible shooting The Family, those silent conversations caught by the stills camera, need to remain just that.

The Family
©Jocelyn Bain Hogg/VII Photo Agency

The images in The Family, introduce us to the world of villainy post Joe Pyle Snr. Pyle, from South London, was the head of a crime family who counted the Kray twins among his friends. He died of motor neurone disease in 2007. The work documents the four ‘brothers’ bequeathed the Pyle Snr. crime patch; where these scions of the Pyle family compete with international gangs and comply with others to maintain their heritage. Along with images of paying respect at the cemetery, wakes, communions, and unlicensed boxing matches, we find the protagonists relaxing at home in suburban Surrey: watching Chelsea on TV, fooling about with the kids, playing basketball in the yard. Photography is JBH’s family and books his children. Books matter, they are lasting; his legacy. They make a statement. Two more books are planned for 2012. The joke is that if The Family isn’t published before Christmas, JBH would not be celebrating it; but no one seems to be laughing. I lighten the mood and suggest that Foto8, who will publish the book, release the slogan, “Publishing books, saving lives”. But no one seems to be laughing. Back home, I check my bank balance, Christmas list, and pencil in for all my friends and relatives, 'a copy of Jocelyn Bain Hogg’s The Family'.

Dench Diary, in conversation with Jocelyn Bain Hogg from Peter Dench on Vimeo.

Jocelyn Bain Hogg will be exhibiting  
The Family at White Cloth Gallery, Leeds UK, Spring 2012.

Copies of The Family is available to buy from Foto8 publishing including limited editions.

A version of this feature first appeared in issue #2 of Hungry Eye magazine, copies available to buy here.

How I Shot the Royal Wedding

Central London is packed. No one moves. A man sobs, another coughs, birds flutter, silence returns. It’s just after 9am on September 6^th 1997. A giant screen in Hyde Park shows a gun carriage taking the coffin of Diana, Princess of Wales on a four-mile procession to Westminster Abbey. Every minute of the journey a single bell chimes. On top of the Royal Standard draped coffin are lilies from her brother and sons, Princes William and Harry, a poignant card reads ‘Mummy.’ After the service, I joined the route of the funeral cortege that would take Diana on her final journey to the Spencer family home in Northamptonshire and waited for the shot.

I had been in London for just over a year trying to find my vocation as a photographer. I thought an iconic image of the hearse would be a valuable addition to my portfolio, to show commitment, dedication and the ability to identify important historical moments. As I waited, the price sticker on the sole of a shoe worn by a woman kneeling nearby caught the eye. I crouched to frame, there was quiet applause and the twirl of tossed long stem roses, a whoosh, and the hearse had gone along with both picture opportunities. On the long walk to find the nearest open pub (it was on Upper Street 3.5 miles away) I photographed the flags flying half-mast and considered whether breaking news photography would be my discipline.

Two years later confirmed it would not. On assignment for the Sunday Times Magazine shooting reportage on the Queen’s Royal Tour to South Africa I travelled around with the royal press pack. On one occasion we arrived at a school classroom in Alexandra Township outside Johannesburg. The pack rushed from the coach to secure a similar vantage point and waited. I was unfettered to explore with my camera. Hours later Betty arrived. The townships children were everywhere; they danced and sang to the Queen and waved her off with their little flags. A man in a suit then collected the flags and boarded the coach. A departing scuffed huffed cloud of dust erased any evidence we had been there.

It is with good cheer then, that I anticipate the more joyous occasion of the Royal Wedding between Prince William and Catherine Middleton. A two-day reportage for the Telegraph Magazine has been in the diary since January removing the pressure to be officially involved and delivering a handsome payday. I even had to turn down German news magazine STERN when a dual-shoot compromise couldn’t be agreed. My brief for the reportage is to document the commoners that line the route; to do a ‘Dench’, reveal the gritty underbelly of life as a royal supporter and produce the antithesis to the inevitable schmaltz to be paraded across the pages of the Daily Mail and Express newspapers. Well, that’s how I interpreted the brief and it’s right up my Mall.

At 10am on the day before, I meet Jessica who will be writing detailed captions for the photographs. This could be irksome for Jessica, a respected staff member deployed to shadow a snapper. If she is irked it doesn’t show and we strut as equals towards Buckingham Palace. I tried to convince the editor to let me do the words and pictures. I’m glad she declined. Jessica is thorough and discreet and the company is welcome. On the way I learn heavyweight photographers Zed Nelson and Simon Roberts will also be contributing adding a bit of friendly competition for page space. I repeat-remind myself to shoot verticals to try and nail a cover.

Along the route we gather micro-features from the royal nutters with Roald Dahl character names embedded on the front line of Great Britain. Americans, Christine and Olivia Wofford carry a large Yellow W and K around to photograph at picture postcard locations. Rosalind Lumb and Wendy Huffwaite peruse a book of Royal Wedding poems. Dulwich Public Schoolgirls Amelia Coe and India Marlow-Prince quaff fizz in their customised pink ‘Will & Kate Forever’ T-Shirts while across the road, tiara topped Amelia Asquith and Charlotte Dunsmore pay their respects at the memorial of the Queen Mother. Opposite Westminster Abbey a more fevered crowd lay in wait. Cynthia McAllister propels a giddy cackle at her husband Phillip whose war medals clink together. Further along, Darci Richards entertains Granny with a strum on the guitar. The mood has been jolly and the 7000 accredited press respectful. We wait for the American news channel CNN to finish their broadcast before our turn with one fanatical family. Presenter Tim Vincent waits for his with Amelia and India.

The alarm bell rejoices at 05.45am. Like before any big day, it has been a fit-full nights sleep. Jessica and I have decided to dress smart and meet in the last carriage of the 06.30 Victoria line tube train at Highbury and Islington station, a plot scene worthy of An Affair to Remember. We are concerned about access and movement so have decided to get in early. Vacate the tube at Victoria and make our way through St. James’s Park to the south side of the route where we will work between Parliament Square and the Mall. Photographing yesterday was crucial. The tents have now been packed away and the rows are deep. I shoot and weave amongst the royal masks, maple leaf bunting, sleeping men, women dressed as brides, the alfresco plastic urinals and the occasional outburst of royal rage as late arrivals encroach on established viewing positions. We pause to talk to the impeccably suited Harry Arthur (8) and brother Rory (5) and the more dishevelled Berry Collins and Gloria Doherty, who slept under the stars and have ‘appropriated’ a tent for shelter. They complain that unlike at a wedding in their community, they haven’t even been offered sandwiches and a drink.

As Big Ben tocks towards wedding o’clock I decide the best place to photograph will be from Parliament Square. There’s a massive cheer, Dalia Yousif is hoisted onto the shoulders of Panos. I snap some frames of his thigh-clenched face and ask what Dalia can see. It’s the litter pickers on one final round. Another cheer and she grabs a frame of Prince Harry. It’s the first I’ve seen of the A-list wedding guests. As William took Kate up the aisle, I was probably only a straight 100-metres away. Cocooned in a living cordon I photograph what I can. 10-year old Callum Lewis uses a ‘Blighty’ periscope to scan for action. Ben Fowler and William Fox-Staeton picnic on the grass. Mr Higgins chuffs his pipe, 21-year old Rhyll de Teglia has a solitary moment and a woman picks up dog-poo. There’s a little Britain-village fete-Henman Hill kind of feel to the proceedings.

Over the two days I shoot 686 frames, FTP an edit of ‘as shot’ 82 to the Telegraph Magazine and head off for a day clay pigeon shooting in the Oxfordshire countryside. On return the TM has edited 13 images to be delivered as polished, ready-for-publication files. This is encouraging. My hopes are for six consecutive pages with a double-page opener. I text my friends and call my Mum. Finally, I think she will have something to be proud of produced by her son to frame and hang in the spare bedroom. I asses Martin Parr’s effort on the Magnum website and think perhaps, I may have edged it on the day.

Saturday 7^th, the day the Telegraph Magazine Royal Wedding souvenir edition is published. It’s with leaden feet that I head out to buy a copy. Three days after the wedding I received a call delivering the “AWFUL” news. None of my photographs would be published; zero. nought, nowt, nada. I’ve been around long enough, just, not to take this personally and got proactive, called STERN to see if it was too late to send some their way. The subsequent elimination of Bin Laden had squeezed out wedding pages. I get six images on to the CORBIS website for syndication and upload 50 to ALAMY but it all feels a little bit late. 20 are posted on my website, I Tweet the link and put an album on Facebook. Responses are good: Martin O’Neill thinks them “Most amusing”, Sam Christopher Cornwell, “Great stuff.”

Wincing back a double vodka tonic I find Zed’s 6 images over two pages and Simon’s one image over two pages treading water in the Getty pool publication. Slightly embarrassed at my exclusion, I text my friends and call my Mum with the news. It seems even the staunchest cynics have been seduced by the occasion (except me). And the wedding is to be remembered and revered as a right royal fairytale (except by me). I now know, why I don’t officially shoot weddings. You wouldn’t want me at your wedding, and in all honesty, I probably wouldn’t want to come. I raise a glass to the hundreds of millions that watched TV coverage of the wedding and consider instead, the next royal funeral.

More Royal Wedding photos HERE

Educating Peter

When we heard that three Middlesex University Students had won place in the National Portrait Gallery as part of the Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize exhibition we wanted to know more. More than a decade ago photojournalist Peter Dench graduated with a first-class degree in photography but no idea how to make a living, so we sent him back to school to see how today's photography students are being prepared for the real world.

I am standing in the National Portrait Gallery looking at the Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize exhibits. 60 images selected from 6000 submitted by 2400 photographers. Perhaps more startling than the tumescent My British Wife is three of the entries are from students. Students of Middlesex University (MU). Last year they had two exhibitors. In the awards previous incarnations I had success in 1999, 2001 and 2003. The last seven years a cold slap in the face. MU are clearly doing something right and I want to know what. I give BA Photography Programme Leader David Simmonds a call and enrol for a day. It’s time for this snapper to go back to school, Educating Peter, the sequel.

Like any student before their first day I’m nervous. Will I fit in? What shall I wear? Jump on the tube to leafy Cockfosters and ponder the day ahead, a day talking with students. I suppress my inner Paul Calf and scan the Metro for research; Gillian McKeith is not pregnant, Morrisey’s been a naughty boy. I pause at the gates. It’s been 15 years since I walked out of University and I momentarily doubt my ability to return.

David strides forward, Royal College of Art Graduate and respected photographer in his own right. Thankfully he’s not wearing an elbow padded jacket and cravat. He introduces 26 year-old BA student, Asef Ali Mohammad. Asef was given a brief to produce a series of photographs that use ‘America’ as a starting point to the creative process. While others in his year took off to the studio flinging cream pies at the statue of liberty, Asef took off to Kabul. MU didn’t discourage him and advised he text his daily progress. Foreign communications often being what they are, they weren’t always received. While concerned, staff trusted Asef’s ability to complete the assignment safely. His resulting Photo Essay ‘Stories From Kabul’ is a series of colour portraits featuring ordinary Afghan people, Caterers, TV executives, Beauticians, The Police. It premiered as a 4m 45s multi media piece on the prestigious FOTO8 website. Subsequently US Newsweek published the reportage across four pages paying around $1600. I decide not to mention selling, as a student, a portrait of Sir Richard FitzHerbert Baronet, Squire of Tissington for £25 to Derbyshire Life & Countryside.

Asef is exceptional and may be the exception. I navigate the 30+ Macs in the digital suite looking for his antithesis. The Macs only have Photoshop installed. Social networking addicts must vacate. Over the shoulder of one student I spy images of a stunning model. I introduce myself to Rokas Darulis. The model is his girlfriend, who is a model, ranked among the top 50 models in the world. Lithuanian-born Darulis, who wouldn’t look out of place on the catwalk, graduated from MU in 2009 with a first. In a year working as a pro, commissions from Magazines Pravda (in Lithuania), Monika and Tank are casually referred to. Elite Model Agency and Svyturys Beer tick the commercial client box. Accolades already on the shelf include the AOP Open Awards and Taylor Wessing. Aha! one of the years MU inclusions. I flick through the brochure and find the entry Ernest and Ernest from his project; It doesn’t matter who you sleep with, a series of portraits of people of the same sex in bed together. A subtlety lit portrait portraying two of Darulis friends. I note ‘same sex relationships’ as a possible ingredient in the Taylor Wessing victory sauce.

I reflect on the projects from my University 'class of 95’. Roger photographed himself naked. Debra photographed herself nearly naked painted white. Sharon portrayed herself smoking a cigarette. Sarah chose a child’s plastic farmyard cow to document. Jane simply snapped the BBC Soap Eastenders playing on the TV. To be fair, Sarah went on to graduate from the RCA; Aperture has published a Monograph of her photographs. Debra is co-proprietor of a gallery in Brooklyn, New York. Perhaps the MU liberty statue pie flingers will end up chairing a World Photography Organisation while a Photojournalist like Asef will graft for recognition in a world of grant refusals and shrinking budgets. It’s a common tale.

Back at MU, Squiz, already a brand, (squizhamilton.com), shows striking work in progress from a self-funded 10 day fashion shoot in Japan. Estimated cost, a dedicated £2500. Tottenham resident Inzajeano Latif, a 31-year old mature student and graduate from the MA at MU, is also in attendance. Latif has already impressed picture editors finest Cheryl Newman with commissions for the Telegraph Magazine. Among other achievements, an Ian Parry Award Show Finalist, work featured in the FOTO8 Summer Show and D&AD Awards. The 2009 Taylor Wessing poster was Latif’s inclusion, Female Boxer Number 3. I scribble down, female boxers in bed together?

After being ejected from the digital suite a tour of further facilities follow. A historic smell permeates one room. Stepping in, through the amber gloom, over 30 traditional black and white enlargers morph to attention. David explains the importance of teaching the craft. He deplores the quick fix digital prints produced by students as if an afterthought. He encourages them to treat the process with the same develop, stop and fix precision you would an Ansel Adams landscape. David is constantly slowing people down. The frantic ‘shoot 1000’s of frames something must be good sort it out in Photoshop later attitude’ must stop.

It is not unrealistic to compare my experiences of 15 years ago. The principals of education remain the same. Equip a student with the necessary skills for a career in their chosen industry after education. I sped through my University doors with a First Class (Hons) Degree in Photographic Studies and headed for London. I would join Reuters (I’d seen a photograph I liked credited in a newspaper) and travel the world. The folio was lost in the Reuters system. Two years on the dole followed. I had no realistic concept of how to approach the industry. On reflection, my impressions are the lecturers were self-serving. Their own personal projects a priority. It is important for a tutor to have a profile outside of education but not at their students expense. Their efforts are still as bemusing now as they were then, Portraits of fish, found objects outside photographed inside, views on top and under a table. It was with a sense of the inevitable that our final year degree show was called Introspection. Academically the work of Jo Spence, Cindy Sherman and Nan Golding prevailed. It took me years just to remove the lens cap without feeling a misogynist. My dissertation on Dr Diamond and his use of photography in the treatment of female lunatics has not been useful.

It is with these concerns that I head to lunch with David. Over wine and calamari David explains how the course reflects the industry. Deadlines are non-negotiable, lateness an immediate markdown. Students are introduced into the industry as much as possible and Industry to the students. There is a healthy visiting lecture programme from retouchers and photographers to magazine editors and gallery curators. The only visiting lecture I remember was a philosopher who posed the question, ‘does green exist’? For two hours. It does. I seriously questioned if I wanted to. Internships and competition submissions at MU are compulsory. Assisting is encouraged. Tim Walkers’ assistant of five years, Alison Tanner, is on hand to advise. Rather than a ‘Jack of all trades’ approach to portfolios the strategy is to produce one substantial coherent body of work that the creator is passionate about. There is an open door policy from staff to students. The course is young and has already made a significant mark. David is realistic enough to suggest only 15% of graduates may go on to make a living taking photographs. Other employment opportunities within the industry are covered. Being a Technician is not considered a failure.

Back on Campus, David is keen for me to meet Steven Barritt (35) another MU MA graduate. I’m not so keen to meet Steven. The Taylor Wessing brochure introduces it’s protagonist as a product of the 'I photograph myself naked’ approach. Steven’s portrait The Solitude of Pygmalion from the series Analogous Mythography is based on the Greek myth of a sculptor who fell in love with his sculpture. Steven said: “I made a lot of effort putting on lots of weight and letting myself go, even resorting to not washing for weeks.” Essentially, a dirty Steven sits naked on an unmade bed surrounded by booze and with walls covered in posters and magazine articles on Britney Spears. I warm to him immediately. Steven wants to make enough money from photography to get out of London. He prefers the influence of Truro on his photography. His Anachronisms portrait series for his MA show are beautifully considered, meticulously planned 5x4 film portraits. It took him around nine months to shoot the first frame. That’s academics for you. Eight years discipline as a former computer programmer has left an imprint. Steve’s umbilical connection with MU has him lined up to interview for a teaching position.

All of the students I spoke with expect to hit the ground running as working pro photographers. They all have a print folio and eschew the argument for iPads. Cited influences are the ones that have shaped previous generations of snappers - August Sander, Bruce Davison, James Nachtwey, Walker Evans, Cecil Beaton. They speak fondly of their tutors and hope to retain a relationship with the University. We talk through the afternoon amicably as equals. Industry names are exchanged with familiarity. I even note down a few new ones. Social networking is understood and embraced. I consider myself a bit of a player ( 500+ Facebook friends!) and suggest they keep in touch. I leave them my card. There is nothing in the inbox when I get home, or the next day. I search them out. Squizhamilton has 4956 Facebook friends. I request to be his 4957^th. Rokas Darulis 2365, most of them I assume beautiful. Inzajeano Latif, 1333. Steven Barritt, well at least he’s clothed in his profile photo.

Curious to find a few students not drafted in for my benefit and craving female company I peel off unescorted to the studio. It’s industrious and populated. A jewellery student sparkles on her back. Photo student Holly, fragrant clipped and sartorially crisp is setting up for a shoot, a series of portraits on red heads. A young man poses awkwardly on a stool. I make a note to remember his face, a potential Taylor Wessing 2011. Reminded of my pursuit of domination I show students the portrait prize brochures from the previous decade, pen poised to jot down the winning formula. Discussions suggest not much has changed. There was a bit more black and white. The dominating digital 35mm format has conquered the square but the content is constant; the ginger, puberty, teenage girls, nakedness, muff and combinations of all represented. Back at my studio, well The Villers Terrace in Crouch End, I re-assess my own successful entries, verdict - guilty: naked old man; a ginger woman on a urinating horse; two awkward looking children. Seems I’ve been entering content along the right lines all along. I have an idea for the next submission, pick up the phone and dial. “Hello, is that Anne Robinson?”

A version of this feature first appeared in the February 2011 issue of Professional Photographer Magazine

The Year Of Living Dangerously

An independent gallery located at the top of a period building in Cardiff is showcasing some of the most exciting contemporary photography in the UK. On its first birthday Peter Dench catches up with the owners of the Third Floor Gallery to discover if it really is tough at the top.

Maciej Dacowicz is not comfortable. He presses a splayed hand hard into his face and rubs. It’s not the disco ball lights peppering his face that is causing distress. It’s the questions. Maciej doesn’t like questions and doesn’t like to answer them; in fact he doesn’t like to talk much at all. We are at the Third Floor Gallery in Cardiff that he launched with Joni Karanka (Bartosz Nowicki joined some months later). Today is the gallery’s first year anniversary party. I ask Maciej (pronounced mach-ic) what he enjoys about running the TFG, he rubs harder, “Ask Joni.” I’d arrived a few hours earlier. Approaching the gallery Joni and Maciej had parked up outside with a car boot full of beer. It had taken them three hours to choose it checking for the best deals. “Give us a hand Peter,” no one is beyond being asked to help and we take turns to deliver the crates up the 60 stairs past an Indian Dance Class and Taxi Rank to the top-floor premises.

On the 22^nd December 2009 I received an email from Joni that said; ‘Dear Peter, I wander if you’d be interested in exhibiting LoveUK in Cardiff. Maciej Dakowicz and I are opening a small photography gallery in February, and we wanted something with a bit of a nice bang to open up. Any reply is good for me, ranging from interest to rejection with alternative suggestions J.’ Feeling festive I answered in the affirmative. A call from the considered and unassuming Joni followed and the details required softly spoken through a Finnish, Spanish hybrid accent. The gallery and exhibition opened on the 12^th February 2010 to a warm welcome from the Cardiff media and community. Located in the Bay area of Cardiff a short bus ride from the centre, TFG sits comfortably opposite the Millennium Centre and developing Mermaid Quay. A sandwich board at the door of the period building, padlocked to the railings quietly introduces the venue.

One year on I am back visiting the gallery to find out how the first year has progressed for the team and what is involved in running a successful exhibition space. A theme quickly dominates, moneymoneymoneymoneymoneymoney. No one has any and how to get it is a constant time consumer. Joni heads down to Iceland to get some nibbles for the evening bash. The budget is £7-8 but he splurges. 75 piece Tex Max Platter, £4. 36; Chocolate Strawberries, £2; 14 Filo Wrapped Prawns, £2; Blackforest Gateau, £3. I throw in some crisps and buy a couple of pasties to keep us going. TFG has achieved charitable status but the benefits are yet to be realised. Around £700 a month comes from donations, any shortfall is made up from the pockets of each proprietor. There is an Amazon well wishers list that to date has provided an A4 Multifunction Mono Laser Printer, TV, professional trimmer, pair of scissors, tape dispenser, screwdriver set and some white tack (the sandwich board was a wish list gift). In the initial business plan, it was hoped the rent would largely be funded by print sales from each exhibition. Collective sales so far fall short of double figures, this is surprising, since the LoveUK launch the list of exhibitors have been impressive including David Solomons, Jocelyn Bain Hogg, Carolyn Drake, and Magnum royalty David Hurn and Chris Steele-Perkins.

To exhibit, the photographer is approached and direct submissions discouraged. The three gallerists chat informally, usually in the £2-a-pint Captain Scott pub nearby about what work they want to see and what photographers they would like to work with. Volunteers lubricate the gallery, a central pool of around a dozen help with the day-to-day running. This allows Joni, Maciej and Bartosz to concentrate on off-site matters. The volunteers call ponytailed Joni ‘The Thinker’ for his Zen like presence and Maciej ‘The Director,’ because of his matter of fact way of explaining how and when things should be done. There is no nickname for the open faced Bartosz, ‘The Smiler’ wouldn’t be inappropriate. Each team member has no specific role. Tasks are taken as and when by who has the time or most suitable allegiance. Joni and Bartosz are perhaps better with the PR and communication side of it. Maciej with the details, or as he would describe it, “Dealing with the shit.”

Thirty-five people visited the exhibition on the first anniversary day, taking the estimated annual number to over 4000. 50+ guests are jostling for position in the 60ft Sq gallery space tonight. It’s an open-door policy, invites were sent via social networks and word of mouth. The crowd is eclectic with Poland heavily represented courtesy of Maciej and Bartosz. The mood is friendly and familiar. Also well represented is the University of Wales, Newport. Students from the prestigious Documentary Photography – BA (HONS) course gobble beer and peer at the pinned Laura Pannack prints. The University is very important to TFG. It’s proximity, as well as providing a ready and willing rotation of visitors print some of the exhibitions in return for having their name on the fliers and in the gallery space. Photographers often consult the course leader at Newport, Ken Grant, for his opinion before deciding to exhibit at the gallery.

Joni, Bartosz and Maciej are all keen and productive photographers as well as appreciators of photography. However, Joni is on hiatus from taking his own photographs, too busy with his paid day job and the gallery. Bartosz, a recent graduate from Newport is quickly finding his voice. Maciej has already pinched the industries consciousness with his pictures and has his 5000 or so Flickr followers anticipating each update. Cardiff After Dark, his burgeoning project on the city’s nightlife is where he thrives. Five images over four pages from the project were included in the Street Photography Now book and the work helped him to achieve an honourable mention in the reportage competition for National Geographic Polska magazine for Polish National Geographic. His work has appeared in many national and international publications, The Guardian, Independent, American Photo and Der Spiegel among them.

I have walked with Maciej along St Mary Street where the bulk of his project is shot. The spectacle of the street has held his attention since the Pole moved to Wales from Hong Kong in 2004. I’ve seen my fair share of Britain’s bad behaviour and St Mary Street is top ten. A nightly production penned by the devil himself, choreographed girls shiver, totter and titter through the litter warmed only by the click flick of cigarette lighters - the Police and the bloodied never far away. On this occasion Maciej was fidgety in his skin. He admits to a lull in creative libido, researching too many pictures on the Internet to be interested in taking them. I’m sure it will pass. He usually shoots in tandem with another snapper for safety, each watching the others back, the imbibing stars of Cardiff After Dark haven’t relished the attention (although the council did deliver a yellow skip to the street to help with the mess after seeing some of the work). Certain bars are out of bounds, the security recognises him, his name is down and he’s not coming in. I left Maciej at 3am; he stuck around for a while, just in case.

In The Claude Hotel over lunch the following day I asked him how his night went. Clicking through the results I spot some keepers. What Maciej enjoys about photographing he won’t say. What inspires him to take photographs he doesn’t quite know. What’s the best thing about running a gallery? It’s difficult to explain. Is he happy with his situation? Stopping on a frame of a couple kissing in the rain under a black leather jacket, I would suggest that for 1/200^th of a second each night spent on the street in Cardiff - he is.

At a recently attended private view in the West End of London, the glass-fronted and lighthouse bright interior felt intimidating, the thousand pound prints inhibiting and the bar staff prickly on repeat returns to refill. There wasn’t a Tex Mex Platter in sight. Bounding up to the Third floor Gallery you know you’ll be welcome, to have a drink and a chat or just to look through the donated books. There’s an adjoining artist studio where Ian Smith is currently resident that gives the place a feel of a work in progress and one you are encouraged to take part in. Exhibitions come and go every four to six weeks. TFG is your friend, an arm around the shoulder, a social club for the creative and surprisingly forgiving. At the party I see an ejected fist from the opening show event that one-year ago put a hole in the wall so big it could have been appropriated for use on TV by Anton Du Beke, “Bring on the wall!” As the anniversary hour approaches, shots are distributed and speeches delivered. A comment in the visitors' book catches the eye, "With all the technologicel (sic) advances, people don't change that much. Loved the show. Came with my daughter Amy who is studying photography in college, and is a big fan. Also, good to know you're not only alive but vital." I sniff the 50% proof Finnish vodka and down a toast to the Third Floor Gallery being alive and vital in another year.

A version of this feature first appeared in the April 2011 issue of Professional Photographer Magazine