W FOR WEATHER
December 27th, 2008 adminA picture I took for We English during the freak snow storm we experienced on April 6 is published in today’s Saturday Telegraph Magazine in their ‘2008 from A to Z’ issue.
I know I promised not to talk about the weather again, however, my picture appears on the ‘W for Weather’ page! The caption reads- “Britain has long been accustomed to April showers, but the snow that affected much of the country on April 6 may take a bit of getting used to. Yet, as the four seasons that we all once enjoyed separately blurred into one, there was at least some semblance of stability provided by a traditional British summer – of widespread floods.”
Tandridge Playing Fields, 2nd April 2008 © Simon Roberts
In a similar round-up of the news in 2008, today’s Guardian features an article by Decca Aitkenhead where she recalls the year’s best and worst times. It provides quite an interesting context for the year in which I produced We English. You can read it here.
January 2nd, 2009 at 1:54 pm
Hi Simon,
How has the narrative of 2008 affected your thinking about ‘We English’?
Do you think that the positioning of the work now has a major relationship to the recession narrative, and if so what sort of implications do you think that might have? Has the work shifted from being concerned with an aspect of contemporary Englishness to being concerned with the English at this particular and very specific time, or in relation to the specific ‘event’ of collapsing into recession? How do you feel about these questions?
It isn’t really the same thing, but here’s a link to an interview with Alec Soth discussing the shifting situation of his ‘Last Days of W’ work in the wake of Obama’s election. http://www.pdnonline.com/pdn/content_display/photo-news/photojournalism/e3i260af0867f21cdd31a1211bb5ab07a85 Soth describes his work as a reflection on the tired and worn-out America that Bush was about to leave behind, an America that suddenly and unexpectedly transitioned into an a hopeful and optimistic tone after Obama’s victory. Soth’s work seems able to negotiate what could be seen as a miscalculation on his part – drawing on the temporality of using newsprint in place of a book, and also on the ambiguity of his ‘dusk or dawn’ device. Has any of your thinking about ‘We English’ undergone comparable changes? For example, have you felt any compulsion to reconsider the text that will accompany the work?
I’d be really interested to learn about any changes in your attitude towards your project at this late stage in its production.
January 5th, 2009 at 3:10 pm
In reply to Dave’s comment above, the positioning of my work will not be affected by the recession narrative of 2008. The economic downturn has very much been a global event affecting most countries in the developed world and one which is not unique to England. Although, the work is partly concerned with portraying the English at a particular time in history.
I see this blog as part open research and part contextual framework in relation to my photographic production for We English and as such, I think it is important to flag up certain social, cultural, political and economic conditions within which the work has been made (for instance, see my previous post on newspaper headlines – http://we-english.co.uk/blog/?p=445). This is more for historic reference rather than to play any major role in influencing my editing or positioning of the work.
On a practical note, a large proportion of the photographs taken for the book, were done so before September 2008 when the enormity of the economic recession became apparent.
I imagine the economic narrative might have a greater influence next year with more people re-considering where and how they spend their leisure time, with many choosing to stay in England rather than venturing abroad. A fact that I’m sure will be embraced by local tourist boards across the country.