announcing the ambiguous book project!

If you arrived here via my books on Blurb then thank you for making the journey. Look around, touch what you want, don't worry it won't break. While you're here let me tell you about a chance to publish your own work as part of a new Blurb project I'm planning...

If it wasn't reward enough for choosing my book loved; life; London for their stand at Format 11,  Blurb have also kindly offered me a voucher to spend in their store. To spread that goodwill around I'm using it to fund a collaboration. Let me explain my idea.

I'd like to present a sequence of photographs in book form that reflect the experience of the street. The theme? Ambiguity. The modus operandi? A simple game of word association...but using pictures instead.

This is not a kind of Street Photography Now project that you go out and shoot. No, this is about images you've already made. The idea is to really look at those pictures again. Find something in them. Something that may have not been the original reason to take or save them. Something that you, and it need only be you, can connect with an image selected by another photographer who, in turn, has made a connection to another image...and so on and so on. The link could be the circumstances surrounding it, an otherwise insignificant element within it, a simple leap of imagination. Surprise yourself!

OK, still interested? Let me answer some questions...

How are you going to choose the participating photographers?
I'm not. I welcome anyone who's motivated to respond. I'm not fussy! I'm not looking for Flickr account links or website URLs.

So this is all about black and white, old school, urban gloom? 
You disappoint me. I love colour! I welcome any format too: digital or lomo, iPhone or pinhole.

It's a London thing, right?
Not at all. Small town America, mega city China. Anywhere in between.

How much do you want me to pay? 
Nothing. Nada. Zip. All I request is a little of your precious time, gratis. Believe me, it'll be a great investment!

OK, so how much can I make?
See answer above. Be advised this is not a path to riches. This is a non-profit exercise for all of us. The book will be sold at cost on Blurb, just for the warm glow of satisfaction of creating something unique.

This sounds too good. Where's the small print? 
I see you're a hard sell.
Believe me, I want to make this process as simple as possible.
Yes, I'll co-ordinate the exchange of images and the production of the book.
No, you don't have to sign up to Blurb. 
Yes, you will be credited as co-author of the finished book.
No, your image will not be used for any other purpose than this project without your permission. Same goes for your email address.

OK, I'm in! Where do I sign?
Wonderful. Just send me an email with the subject "I'm in!" to sean@waysofwalking.net

I'll be in touch to start the chain. 

Museum of London street photography show - countdown begins

Well, the Museum of London's street photography exhibition opens this week and I'm really looking forward to it. Highlighting our city’s rich tradition of street photography, one that is as distinctive as Paris or New York, is long overdue. This survey, in the setting of the Museum, is a perfect place to consider what the images reveal of London's social history. It's fantastic this form of photography has risen in popularity in recent years but I hope the presentation of contemporary images alongside those of Paul Trevor’s will make us stop and think what a street photograph can actually be, as well as others by Paul Martin will serve as a reminder of its roots.

As for my own work I am intrigued how it will be presented. Despite being a proud Londoner one of the characteristics of my photographs is how ambiguous they are in term of location and, to some extent, time as well. However I can testify the main image selected for the show is from 1989, taken in London's West End!

There will also be some of my more recent work projected as part of a sequence of contemporary London street photography.

I love how the show had broadened its appeal, curating work via The Big Issue and Metro, and stimulating debate on the merits of The Ted Heath Orchestra versus The Cheeky Girls as soundtracks to some of the show's photographs. I sincerely hope the programme of supporting events over the summer makes the most of this attention and delivers an international impact as well as one, to use a popular phrase, which establishes a legacy to Londoners.

read all about it...man gives birth

As a break from processing my small mountain of rolls of exposed film, I've been working with Stuart Keegan on printing some recent work. Yes, I really do still take pictures!

The ritual of film processing > contact sheets > first edit > work prints > final edit > finished prints is a long journey from the moment of making the initial exposure. I've irreverently compared it to a pregnancy as some of these "new" photographs were taken over 9 months ago.

I don't religiously document the precise date and location of my pictures, no EXIF data for me I'm afraid, let alone a more intimate account of what attracted me to take them. Consequently when I selected these new pictures to be brought back kicking and screaming into the world it was, at the risk of over-extending this metaphor (not something I could ever be accused of, naturally), on the basis of their ability to stand up on their own two feet. Inevitably this judgement is still subjective - hey, this is art after all - but I approach them with a degree of detachment comparable to anyone looking at them for the first time. I don't expect to change people's opinion of them once the title or "story behind them" is revealed. In that way I suppose the story is thrown back to the viewer to make up for themselves.

It would be fun to record those stories in some way. This idea seems to lend itself most naturally to online sharing such as Flickr. However I'm not thinking of simply an instant comment on a website - although that might be nice - but something more considered. I'm thinking out loud here (I wonder how that translates into Korean or Chinese?) but perhaps I should investigate the collaboration approach that Blurb offers. I'll look for some examples and let you know.

Thanks for listening.

the reluctant flâneur

One of the topics raised in my street photography talk at Photofusion last year was the approach of setting yourself a project as a street photographer, working to rules, taking pictures for a particular purpose, versus a more aimless, wandering style. I'd originally, and a little arrogantly, put myself in the latter category.

Setting limits surely contradicts the whole ethos of street photography? The romantic tradition of the flâneur predicates a reckless abandon to chance. There's no plan of action or premeditation. Everything has equal significance before the steady gaze of the impartial, impassioned observer.

Well, with a little more thought on my part, and the purpose of this website, despite those ambitions I have a number of conditions surrounding my work that mean I do not so neatly portray the free wheelin' style of the boulevardier.

And, as is the fashion of the web, I'll turn them into a list (and include yet another gratuitous French reference).

Recipe for Street Photography à la Sean McDonnell

film

35mm

black & white

HP5

SLR

Olympus

single lens

fixed

28mm

1/500

f16

blind

London

West End

daytime

weekdays

outside

natural light

sunshine

people
don't go back

Season well and simmer for 25 years, stirring occasionally.

I've now come to a point where I'm thinking about people. Who do or don't I take pictures of?

The mélange of social classes is a defining characteristic of street photography. What attracts me to London's West End in particular is that mix of shopper, worker, student, tourist, day tripper, native (and all the subtle classifications between) thrown into eachother's company.

However the privileges of the city are granted by invitation only. London's better than a lot of cities but access and navigation for the less physically able is restrictive. The explicit and implicit presence of authority and surveillance, encourages a conformity of appearance and behaviours and, by implication, draws attention to and discourages those who deviate.  Flipping this around I can't ignore the corresponding position I hold as a single, white, male on the street; one of the silent, invisible, majority, able to go about his business with relative impunity.

When I look at my work I like the diversity of people I see. I feel proud that London is a city where, in spite of the reservations I've touched on, it is a city to roam. However I'm mindful that freedom, and the freedom to record it, is hard won and precious.

Well I don't quite know how I've ended up talking about liberty, equality and fraternity...but then again perhaps I do.
À bientôt, mes amis!

new year, new book

My collection of images I called The Distance Between Us came into being over a year ago. While revisiting my work, I began to saw a number of photographs with two figures interacting with one another through a gesture, eye contact or just being in close proximity to one another. Some of those interactions were obviously intended by both parties, others were not. What interested me was their record of moments that we are all party to, throughout our public lives on the streets. The effect of sharing public space with a random cross-section of others means we experience a level of intimacy that I think is worth cherishing.

I was content to let these pictures live together as a stack of prints. I'd just published two books and wanted to absorb the process and consequences of that. However at the end of last year I felt ready to think about how they could be presented on the printed page.

My original book loved; life; London follows the traditional approach of a monograph: same-size images sequentially presented as they'd appear on a white gallery wall. The second, Portrait of a Street Photographer, is an attempt to put the photographs into the context of why they were made. To reflect the street experience different layouts are used to give the book a rhythm and dissonance. My new book, The Distance Between Us, develops that approach and deliberately presents the images in a fractured way. It's not a printing error!

The decision to use this approach was influenced I confess by the new pocket book format that Blurb have released. It's not a friendly format for full frame 35mm street photography but using the dimensions of the pages to determine the crop and arrangement of the images felt natural and in tune with the ideas behind this particular collection.The paper stock is certainly not for the purist but, again, I feel it complements the nature of these pictures and they add up to something greater than the sum of the parts. Hey, I think I've another book title...