Lomography at the South bank. Click. Amira is the boss of the Lomograph project.
http://www.lomography.com In answer to my intrusive and obvious but well intentioned question she says in a syrupy voice “I am from Vienna” . Click. She sucks on a cigarette with what could seem like disdain but is actually her total immersion in the project at hand – trading places and the Lower Marshes wall outside the festival hall.Click. Today it was featured in the centre pages of the Guardian Newspaper. Click. Click She has what my Parisian sister has: Chic and I like it. Click. If any family members are reading this I am talking of Teguest.Click.
Amira is transfixed in the idea that the Lomography project should be perfect. Click. She is in a sort of matrix/tai chi/zone. She sips her latte gently attaches it back to the table. “And lemn I want to give you a camera so you can be part of Lomography”. Click. Amira beckons one of her workers to give me a camera. It is the coolest thing. I still haven’t opened the box. It rests on my kitchen table. It seems that lomography is all about the action, the process of taking a picture. And I suppose the process of unwrapping is it too. I only want to get the thing out when I have time to read instructions.Click.
I still haven’t unwrapped the freakin camera. Click. Wind. Some people say that a picture speaks a thousand words. Click. I despise the phrase. Click. Truth is, a thousand words speaks a million pictures. Click click. Get that developed at the chemist take it home and put it in the album and show it to your friends. Click.
But I enjoy taking pictures and rather than the two dimensional digital process this is stimulating and attractive. Click. The actual photos come out in a perfect square and the effect of the camera on its subject is very, very particular.Click. I shall open with care and click with it in the hope it clicks with me.
Click with it and it may click with you. Click. Lomography gives breath to my phrase “It ain’t where you go, it’s where you’re at”. Click. I’m loving this residency at the south bank. Click. A week of art. Click. In the fae of the world. Click. Wind. Click. Develop the picture.
hmmm, quite a nice little idea, the site is great – go at random to people's snapshot worlds. do you reckon the camera is what has made it obviously such a 'hip' thing? it's doesn' look like uncool people are joining in. i still have a film camera in my bag at all times with some black and white high street film in it. and i still like the shots from it. that said the project just done in hull used both small digitial cameras and disposable film cameras (where i wasn't confident about getting the camera back) and both sets of photos have their strong points. i think for the snapshot part to work people have to feel able to blow their way through a lot of film without worrying about it and actually that is a far bit of cash compared to the nothing that is the cost of digital. i think the problem with digital is too many people just keep them on a pc and don't 'use' them. prints are nice you can hold onto them and pin them on your wall. i wonder where the project goes from here though – does it have a life beyond a very imaginative way of selling the cameras?
see you in a couple of weeks
cb