Mixing personal and professional
Books on the English seem to be popular at present. Last month I looked at the landscape photography of Simon Roberts who captured the English at leisure and now there is a new volume to add to the shelf on the subject, England, My England by Chris Steele-Perkins.
It's a totally different approach. England, My England is a collection of pictures taken over the past 40 years by Chris and includes photographs drawn from a wide range of news stories and features, personal moments and long-term social projects including his much admired look at the Teddy Boys in the late 1970s.
I've been a long-time admirer of Chris' work. His book The Pleasure Principle, in which he explored public rituals in Thatcher's Britain, is often retrieved from the shelf, and even now, many years later, brings delight and a wry smile.
Through the years Chris has approached photography in many ways, from the black and white social commentary of the 1970s through to the more self -expressive images of Mount Fuji that were one of the finalists in this year's awards.
For me though it's Chris' almost personal pictures that work so well. From the two pensioners dancing in 1973 through to the couples picnicking at Glyndebourne in 1988 he manages to capture some of the absurdities of life, yet without looking down or patronising his subjects.
On one level the pictures are remarkably simple. There are no clever techniques, weird angles, just good honest photography.
In the introduction to England, My England David Elliott states:
"Funny stuff photography, it can trigger things you don't expect... This book is not a lament for the past, but merely a record and a celebration of some of the things he (Chris) has lived through, has been fascinated by, and survived."
A photographer never has a day off. A shot of Chris' friends and family on a walk in Kent shows a group of six people all clad in dark coats on a wet day, with one mysterious figure in the distance in red set against a verdant green hillside. Again it is a simple picture, but it snuggles alongside the other frames, and is part of the photographers' life so just as valid as something shot on assignment.
Perhaps the best example of this is the double-page spread that on one side shows a group of homeless men in Holborn, and on the other page a shot of his wife playing "pick sticks" with their son in a warm candle lit home. At first it seems to jar, but then you realise it's a very honest approach, one that many photographers find themselves in as they enter situations that are removed from their own lives to get a picture.
This clash of cultures is there on the page, without comment or judgement. As the title suggests, England, My England is more a story, a journey though a life in photography where every page takes the viewer in a new direction.
All photographs © Chris Steele-Perkins/Magnum Photos. England, My England is published by Northumbria Press.
I'm 
Comments
or to comment.