By 'eck ..

There was a lovely documentary on TV last night about the great photographer Don McCullin and bugger me if it wasn't exactly 27 years to the day since I met him. He was giving a reading of his new book 'Unreasonable Behaviour' at Waterstone's bookshop on Deansgate in Manchester and, when I went up to get my copy signed, he said "Do you know, you're the first person I've spoken to tonight that's got a Northern accent!"

In person ..

Red, forty-three! Hut! Hut!...

And so it is, with delight, that I tell you I've managed to get tickets to see the Dallas Cowboys against the Jacksonville Jaguars at Wembley next November! Phew, that's a weight off my mind! I've been a fan of 'Gridiron' since it started on Channel 4 back in the 80s, so I'm thrilled to be able to finally see one of the 'star' teams in action. Of course, I've photographed the game in the past, but watching the Manchester Allstars play American Football at the Willows Rugby Ground in Salford wasn't quite the same thing, bless 'em!..

I'm having a 'day of domesticity' today. Well, I'm supposed to be! I'd planned to start building some new units for the kitchen but I'd only managed to get some bits out of boxes before I was distracted by other things! I have quite a collection of signed photography books, and somehow I started rearranging them all and putting them into polythene bags to keep them clean. Of course, that then entailed actually looking at them and so, before you know it, half the morning'd gone! I've got some cracking autographs, though! André Kertesz, Mary Ellen Mark, Don McCullin .. even David Hockney, if you count his collages - and why wouldn't you? These are are people I've met, by the way! They're not just books I've bought, pre-signed! That's the equivalent of watching The Allstars when you really wanted to see The Cowboys ..

PS: David Hockney's autograph? You'd swear to God he's written 'Gary Lowry' ..!

War! What is it good for?...

Go and see 'McCullin', the film about renowned war photographer Don McCullin. Bravery, modesty, artistry, humanity and sheer, utter professionalism are what you'll see when you go. That and some of the most powerful proof you'll ever need of how awful mankind is to its brothers and sisters. We went yesterday. One of the 'wars' in Don's life was the conflict in Northern Ireland - he went there for The Observer in 1971 - and guess what was on the front page of yesterday's Observer. An image from the 'war' in Belfast! Police being shot at on the streets of The UK this weekend - forty two years after Don's first images. The sad thing is that he admits that his war photography doesn't change a thing. On a lighter note, he came to Waterstone's in Manchester in 1992 to launch his amazing autobiography, and I dutifully queued to have my copy signed by 'the master'. After a brief chat when it was 'my turn', he looked at me and said "Do you know, you're the first person I've spoken to tonight that's got a Northern accent!"

A kid 'shooting' over a pew in church. That's as close as I ever want to get to war, and it's yet another of the images from my archive. If it's of any interest, I've started a Facebook group to try to promote the Twelve for '13 project.
I'd love it if you joined...