Gwapple me gwapenuts!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well I guess I know what I was doing thirty-seven years ago today. I was reading the British Journal of Photography, which I bought religiously every week for the grand sum of 60p. On this particular cover, the famous TV botanist David Bellamy peered out from behind a leafy bush in a pose I can only imagine he adopted every time he encountered a photographer. (I shot him exactly like that myself!)

 

Inside, there are articles on 'Stills video' for the press and news agencies (I remember the Manchester Evening News buying in just such a system) and the Canon EOS 620. There's a review of an exhibition at The Barbican - a 20th century collection of French photography entitled 'Art or nature', and there are adverts for the Mamiya 645 and the Bronica GS-1. The thing that surprised me most was the 'Classified' pages at the back of the magazine. There are .. wait for it .. EIGHT pages of jobs within photography, ranging from Slide Technicians on £8000 a year, Photography Lecturers on eight to fifteen thousand, Cruise Ship snappers, Black-and-white printers, E6 technicians and even Senior Photographers with the Ministry of Defence with a requirement of City and Guilds qualifications and at least an A,B or C pass in English Language, Mathematics and one Science subject ..

As David Bellamy (Or at least Lenny Henry) would say .. "Gwapple me gwapenuts!!!" 

(And if you don't understand that then you are TOO YOUNG!)

 

Happy Hockney

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I went to Paris recently to see the fantastic new David Hockney exhibition, then discovered yesterday that he and my Dad share the same birthday. (Two great men, two warm summer days in the 1930s!) I was lucky enough to photograph the artist back in December 1996, when he had a show at Manchester Art Gallery, but the work on display in the capital blew that exhibition away. Staged at the magnificent Foundation Louis Vuitton, it features 400 works of art over several floors and, although I found some of it rather childish, there's no denying the vibrancy of his paintings. And to walk into a room and see a picture that's fifty feet across .. wow! Highly recommended, and open until the end of August if you happen to be en Paris ..

PS: Having finished my photographs, I shook the great man's hand and asked for his autograph. I still have it to this day. You'd swear he's written 'Gary Lowry' .. ! 

PPS: Don't you just love the holes in his cardigan!!

 

Dad ..

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It's sixteen years since Dad died, but July 9th is still a poignant day for me .. Happy Birthday, you old fart!

Lucky Angela Trimble

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In 1978, just like every other red-blooded teenage boy with his hormones a'ragin', I used to have a poster of Debbie Harry on my wall. So it came as quite a shock this morning to find out that her real name is Angela Trimble! "I love you, Miss Trimble" hasn't quite got the same punk punch to it, has it? Nevertheless, she still holds a special place in my heart and I'll be forever jealous of Chris Stein for, er  .. er .. let's skip that bit!

And so, happy birthday, Angela! Just turned 80 and looking fantastic. "How did I get so old?" she asked of herself. "I guess I just got lucky .." 

A lost innocence ..

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As I melt in 44 degree heat, I thought I'd show again my picture of Lisa in the bath, probably from that fabled summer of sizzly '76. Lovely shot, isn't it? A 'warm' memory of a time gone by and a valid photographic document of that incredible meteorological 'blip', with a delicious ice-lolly and a cool bath by the front door-step in what was a stand-out year for heat and drought. But hang on, she's got no clothes on!! 

I'd be terrified to take a picture like this these days ..

The Demon ..

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"It was a hot afternoon, the last day of June, and the sun was a demon .. "

At 13 years old I'm not quite sure I knew what was going on in Bobby Goldsboro's gorgeous 1973 hit 'Summer (The first time)' - at that age the only thing I'd ever been seduced by was the Kodak Instamatic - but I can certainly relate to his comments about today's excessive heatwave. "One ten in the shade .." sings Bobby and, after a quick click on a conversion website, I can tell you it's almost exactly that .. 42.9 degrees centigrade actually .. in our back garden this afternoon. I'll bet the sweat's "trickling down" the front of quite a few gowns today, but surely there can't be many people planning a night of steamy passion in this weather? Maybe there are. Perhaps it's an age thing again .. !

 Ps: Feeling the heat in Manchester. I used to cross this square almost every day when I went to the offices of the Manchester Evening News. It's all been built on now, the sun-worshippers have to look elsewhere. One of my Olympus XA shots from the 1980s.

 

 

 

 

It's an age thing ..

 

 

 

 

 

 

Funny to think Rod Stewart will be playing Glastonbury today. I mean, who the hell wants to see an 80 year old geezer up on stage, reeling out his 'hits' for an audience one quarter his age? And then I have to come clean. Last weekend I skipped over to Manchester to see one of my all-time favourites, good ol' Charlie Harper from punk band UK Subs. At 81 he's even older than Rod but, oh boy, you wouldn't know it. Beer in hand, he belts out songs that first saw the light of day when I was 18, way back in the 1970s. (And if that's what punk and alcohol do for you, then I'm glad I signed up early!) It's just a matter of taste, isn't it? I wouldn't dream of standing in a crowd of 100,000 to watch a screen showing an old fart a quarter of a mile away, but stick me in front of Charlie in a small venue of a couple of hundred punters and I'm in heaven ..

I genuinely dropped upon this photograph this morning, a picture I did of Rod at Manchester City's old Maine Road ground back in the .. 90s? (I'm compiling a set of images for a talk I'm giving next Saturday and there he was, along with a bevy of other 'famous' people in a folder I named 'Slebs'!) I'd forgotten I'd taken it, much as I forget a lot of things these days. It's an age thing ..

Ps: My informal talk 'A life in Press Photography' will take place at GALERIE 16 in Chef-Boutonne at 11 on Saturday. Please come along, if you can remember ..