Day XV

A bit like the now delightfully retro Semisonic album recently re-discovered in all its' glory, today I'm Feeling Strangely Fine. Nothing has changed drastically but, I always seem to enjoy myself in classes, looking forward to leaving my flat this evening too! Also, in a thrilling game of cat and mouse with the wind and clouds I narrowly managed to cheat Mother Nature out of a drenching ... 1-0! Back of the net!

As you've come to expect, and don't say I don't spoil you, like a recalcitrant camel travelling across the temperemental University internet, is the Gert Lush High Resolution image.

One of the things playing on my mind at the moment is the prospect of housing for next year and, to date, having nothing remotely sorted in that area. There's one nice possibility, but certainly nothing definitive and this is the most excited I've been able to get about the whole thing!

In the traditions of vaguely strapping this onto something current and relevant in the world (a bit like a bodged bicycle rack made out of some bungees ...), in my mind, at least, I've linked this to the general uncertainty surrounding most things in the world right now. The Environment, Energy resources, The Economy are all really quite unstable and unsure of where we might going at the moment. It isn't just these issues either. So, like almost everyone, if I stop to think about it: "I don't know where we are going now ..."

Day XIV

Whilst continuing with my downward spiral, I did do something positive and went back and had another chat with the driver of the buses that are parked on Haydn Road all day. He's a really nice bloke and was the first passer-by to really take an interest in what I've been doing. Was good to chat with him, probably did something for both of our days ...

Having not posted many links, I will post another with little or no relevance to Photography unless you really strain hard and look at the, simply excellent, Photoshop work as being linked to the issues of Documentary Truth. I'm posting it because it really made me chuckle, I give you, Dave Benson-Phillips as Edvard Munch's 'The Scream'.

Allowing you see every last rivetting detail is the Gert Lush High Resolution which can contain a double-decker bus, sideways.

Our text for today comes from the emotions of yesterday. Had an alright day; got up, did the door, did the blog, went to our Seminar, talked about Camera Lucida for a seemingly interminable amount of time and then even managed a semi-decent evening not really thinking about the negatives and just enjoying what came along, I was feeling quite good ... Until something got to me and I lost all calm.

The text is an ironic, modern-Pringlist reflection of the fact that (my music taste hasn't changed since I was 13 ... and) forgetting about or ignoring something will not make it go away. In the real world; outside my brain (the weapon of self-destruction that can launch in 45 minutes), this is most commonly seen with Global Warming; something the world and mass media (or mass media and the world, if you prefer), with the exception of the Guardian which is so environmentally conscious it's offices are a treehouse that also serves as a protest base for those opposed to the widening of the A303, seems to care little about until the next new report or study comes along showing how ineffective we have been at reducing emissions. It's suddenly headline news for about five minutes, maybe ten on Channel 4 or Newsnight, before something else comes along the next day and we forget about it again ... until it comes back.

"I guess if we ignore it, it'll probably go away ..."

Day XIII

Aiming for a slightly less depressing tone, today I'm still going for a summary of thought but, in a round-about way slightly more positive and one of the things that keeps me here, plodding along with things as they are ...

Short of the usual introduction, today's photograph in Gert Lush High Resolution lies just beyond the underlined words.

Our text today is once again and born of my modern-Pringlist education (and also an inability to stop listing to old Millencolin albums) and summarises thoughts along the lines of: No matter how much things aren't quite ideal here; if I weren't here it would be altogether worse as almost everyone I know and care about has gone away to University as well; those who haven't are in jobs for a year before they do go, and regularly state that they rarely see each other. It's brilliant when we all come back for the holidays but, it's not like that all the time and so today, with some nice mirror-like glass I am reflecting on the fact that: "The grass will never be greener on the other side ..." ...

Day XII

Ahem! Testing, Testing, One, Two, One, Two ... Let's go nuke Moscow! I shall start today's post, and this new week by detailing a few changes ...

Firstly, I changed the principle text on the door (after re-painting all the white bits to be in line with current Daz guidelines) to something a bit more obvious and engaging of the viewer/people who stare at me when I'm out doing this ...

Secondly, after something of a miserable weekend (mostly spent in my room feeling a bit sorry for myself, like a puppy with one of those daft collars on after an operation) I was somewhat lacking in motivation to do Newspapers today so I've decided to start using my door to express thoughts more personal. At the moment I am reflecting outwardly the affectations of my state of mind, but it may not be strictly limited to that ...

For a closer inspection of my stencilling skills, click to view in Gert Lush High Resolution the underlined words just back up there ...

Today's text is what modern Pringlists call a "neat little phrase" that in the best traditions of Herr Pringle covers a lot of things, over a long time, very concisely. It's also written upside-down, this was not due to an imbalance in my cochlear, it was, also in the most logical traditions of Herr P done for a reason ... That's enough about my former-German teacher, I'm starting to sound like Barthes bleating on about his mother!

"I want the world to turn upside-down again ..." is a reflection of the fact that a lot has changed in my world since starting University in October. Some of this is good, some bad. It seems that the good and the bad in my life have flipped around ...

Before, I was absolutely happy with my friends, with all aspects of my life apart from my Photography, which I avoided and was therefore not bothered by after a while, I just forgot about it as I did other things.

Now however, it is the opposite, after I leave the classrooms (where I am happy to be with the people in this group, and enjoy myself) I have nothing to engage myself with other than my work, which is at least now bringing me pleasure and satisfaction. That in itself most certtainly not a bad thing.

When I return home, the old friendships remain as they were and my old life returns. I fit back into it like my very worn shoes. I forget Photography quite happily and enjoy life with people, something I do all too little of here despite being on good terms with my flatmates and you good people of Photography. Everything flips around again ...

Day XI

Another day, another door!

Once again, available in Gert Lush High Resolution.

Today's story is courtesy of The Daily Telegraph and reads: "Teachers to ballot on strike over pay." so I've gone off to a school after "home time" when (almost) nobody is there and, for the second day running, borrowed a bin to prop my door up!

Got a weekend to dedicate my thoughts to possible alterations to this project; a new issue of the Ever-Lowering Standard; more of Camera Lucida and of course, to Stelios from Easyjet ... just thought he deserved a mention!

Day X

Today's sensual seminar explored the nuances of Newspapers and their various party pieces ... as well as Combine Harvesters! I was absolutely in my element!

To indulge those with a thirst for gratuitously large images, if not on this occasion show anything with much extra clarity, I continue to provide links to things (photographs mainly) in Gert Lush High Resolution ...

Today's headline is courtesy of The Independent (or 'Indescribably Boring' to Hugh) and, as you may or may not remember, reads: "Freedom for Gaza (but for one day only)" with the story being about the temporary breach of the border between Palestine's 'Gaza Strip' (not an adult establishment despite what you may read in the Daily Star, infact mere allusion to that is probably enough to put me in Hamas' bad books ...) and Egypt.

The location is an indescript industrial estate car-park with a one-way system 'in play' and the words 'No Exit' conveniently placed there for me. Ironically, I was asked to leave because the security guard wanted to close the gates and end my time within their borders ...

Day IX

Continuing the new trend of being "Short and Snappy", like an angry Dwarf or a smartly dressed Corgi, this post brings you only a little bit more than was strictly necessary!

As has now become the norm, you can view the above in Gert Lush High Resolution! I hope that adds bouyancy to your sea-faring vessel ...

Today's headline comes from my ironically beloved Daily Mail! It's something that affects me quite personally due to events in my past as well as something sadly current but, I'm not going to go into that so publicly; rather alude to it in a rather obvious way! The headline reads "Internet suicide cult?" and despite being a 'Grammar Nana' it's not my job to correct their shoddy punctuation and shepherd away that misguided question mark!

The location is my humble abode in halls, with me in a darkened room, infront of my computer conforming to all of the stereotypes by dressing in black.

Day VIII

Finally heading to Hugh's request for less writing; today's entry has less writing ...


It is also once again available in Gert Lush High Resolution to make the the headline (and every other little thing) more visible for you, the valued reader!

The story today comes from The Telegraph but, it could really have come from any of the day's newspapers (apart from the Daily Star ... oh wait, newspapers ...) as one story dominated proceedings. The state of worldwide stock markets, share prices and the economy. It reads: "Recession fears shake fragile markets."

Today's location, due to the lack of a local stock exchange is infront of a Pawn Brokerage. I thought this fitting after the extract from 'The Bicycle Thieves' seen in today's lecture showed people pawning all they could live without during a period of deep economic turmoil.

That is all and it seems all too brief!

Day VII

Returning from an impromptu visit to London and Reading at the weekend, today thrust me back into the blog with all the force of an arthritic grandmother of 6 ... a bit like my grandmother really.

It had to happen sooner or later, and despite the notable distraction of a headline in The Guardian involving the positively alluring topics of Scientology AND Nazism, I still couldn't resist going with the Daily Mail!

My truly ironic 'love-affair' with the Daily Mail is well publicised, primarily by myself but, I was told it would be appearing in a comedy show at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival by William Hanmer-Lloyd entitled "All Daily Mail writers must die!" after telling the man himself the hilarious anecdote of Daily Mail Danger: one man's battle against pensioners; time; and, in the secondary (Double Danger) and conculding (Do or Die) of the DMD Trilogy, all conceivable odds.



Today's photograph is the first to be available in Gert Lush High Resolution, innit? (I believe we have already established that it is.) Be warned, it is larger than the entire of Staffordshire but, this burgeoning increase in resolution should allow those who wish to read what is on the door the opportunity to do so!

Today's headline, as has already been mentioned is courtesy of the Daily Mail and concerns Home Secretary Jacqui Smith and the issues of Law and Order (not the long-running American crime drama shown on Channel 5 after people have switched off following the conclusion of C.S.I. Grimsby), as well as the far more important issues of Kebab Shops; what she eats and with whom.

The headline, trimmed slightly of extra words, reads: "Home Secretary admits streets are not safe." although the lack of direct quotations within the Mail's sensational headline (and subsequent article) indicates that it is unlikely she actually said that and the whole thing based in a Kebab shop in Peckham has been blown out of proportion like a deformed balloon filled largely with hot air.

Today's location is in honour of these take-away origins of the whole story and is Captain Cod, a local Fish and Chip providing establishment. Sadly they don't wrap fish and chips in Newspaper anymore, absorbing grease is one of few suitable purposes for the Daily Mail!

A(nother) totally irrelevant (surely not!) aside from my weekend away takes the form of this charming blog: It isn't serious; it isn't really related to Photography either but, in bringing it to you within days of it's foundation, I am showing you something from the cutting edge! You saw it here first: Animals in Suits.

Day VI

Today's 'effort' comes from something of a Photographic 'Mufty' or non-Uniform day in that there's a 'Have I got News for you' style guest publication coming at you like a recalcitrant camel today; not exactly hot from the pages of my very own Ever-Lowering Standard.

A one-man-army of a publication inspired by a combination of Private Eye and The Onion; The Ever-Lowering Standard began as the irrelevant scribblings of a terminally bored Customer Assistant in Tesco Express with stories covering the apparently random issues of Pork Pies, Deck Chairs and the populace of West Wiltshire villages. Critically acclaimed, it has been described as "The most constructive waste of company time I have ever seen!".

In the second of two issues, it started making an abstract connection to actual news stories within a vain attempt to amuse. Though, one would hope, entirely fictional, I decided to include one headline from its' pages as it does show something of another, less serious side to my view of the world, current affairs and politics.


Emerging from the depths of literary despair; our 'chosen one' is: "Another sour lemon for Fathers for Just Ice." an article detailing the furstration felt by campaigners fighting for the removal of slices of citrus fruit from soft-drinks and bottles of over-priced commercial lager as well as their despair at seeing many a publicity stunt wrongly attributed to the much publicised pressure group Fathers for Justice.

The fact that my room, in all honesty, is not usually decked out wall-to-wall with Tesco based 'memorabilia' (and I make a 'W' symbol with my hands to anyone who may say otherwise) means that despite all I said about cropping yesteday, I have had to trim this one in a little bit! The border remains on the basis of the 'Michael Jackson' defense, and at full size when the background turns white, you can read what it says today! Fantastic!

The location for this somewhat fanciful tale is one of the few bits of relevance to anything in this whole story. Due to the pouring rain and my distinct lack of desire to have an intense natural shower prior to jetting off to London this weekend, I constructed a (very, to the power of 17) small 'installation' in my room from carrier bags; the original stories (hand-written on till receipt paper) themselves and other items of 'memorabilia' (including but, not strictly limited to: The Power of Three - an "elite" body of five Pound notes from accross the British Isles) from my time in the Tesco Express store where it all began, co-incidentally enough on a Friday morning! Quite the proverbial "raro" ...

Day V

Following on from today's tutorial with the lengthy discussion about McDonals, today I have prepared the "Headline double-header"; the double-whammy; the Big Mac, BK Whopper or Footlong Sub of this newspaper headline based feast, all served up on the usual blue door.

With fractionally less writing to appease Hugh (although the border remains because as well as liking it; I actually use it for the very reason suggested for its' removal - the connotations of an uncropped image and as someone who does everything possible to acheive the desired composition in camera to avoid cropping, that's important to me), here it is in all it's chipped, faded and flaky glory:

Thursday is traditionally the day of publication for my local newspaper, the Somerset Standard, so I was keen to include that if, on the off-chance their lead story had any relevance to something going on in the world outside of a small Somerset market town. By chance their lead story: "Driver's miracle escape." was deemed sufficiently relevant to what the Times were going on about with "Huge rise in traffic is choking the roads." (Can't resist: Choking the roads? Probably isn't doing much for the environment either, but I suppose that may be a story for the Guardian to get it's teeth into ...) so I slapped them both on and I too hit the road.

Today's location continues to bring a visual connection to the news into my work and is a car dealership, a place that sells new cars to add to those already on the road.

Day IV

After hearing about the flooding in my home counties in the West Country and with the heavy rain throughout yesterday that turned the car park at my halls into a boating lake and Haydn Road into an extension of the Kennett and Avon; I was hoping for a headline about the floods down there so that I could take a photograph relevent to that current news story that is happening in the part of the world I hail from and still have a strong connection with through friends, family and my own emotional attachment to the place I grew up.

Also making a cameo appearance as an extra prop (not propellor, the need for an outboard has passed) is an umbrella (ella ella ella eh eh eh) I found in the street this morning before lectures and looked like a bit of a former-BBC Newsreader and 999 presenter named Michael (in other words: a Buerk) carrying around on my head for a while ...

Today's headline comes courtesy of The Times; the only paper carrying the flood story on the front-page (even the Western DailY Press wasn't running it - there was probably a pressing story about a combine harvester or something - I did an ET and Phoned Home to check) with the minimalist headline of: "Flood misery yet again."

Today's location is the corner of my halls of residence car park, the only area I observed that had retained any sizeable body of water from yesterday's rain! When I was out taking last night's photograph there were puddles the size of Lake Huron but, these had obviously been swallowed whole (like a fisherman's tale of a Giant Squid) by the drainage system, bravo!

Day III

Responding to what Tom and head-honcho Hugh (if this were an English project I could have hit the Amazing Arizona All-Star Alliteration ... err, Bonus) put forward after the first couple days of door based bloggery, I have today started trying to link my photographs with the news in a visual way. This may not always be feasable due to, amongst other things, the logistical concerns involved with moving a door that weighs nearly as much as I do around using just my own limited physical strength, but I will be trying!

Today's news story is brought to you fresh from the environmentally conscious pages of The Guardian and reads as follows: "F.B.I. wants instant access to British identity data."

With this story it is fairly obvious that the underlying issue is with crime; the targetting of criminals and international crime, no doubt placed under the umbrella (ella ella ella eh eh eh) of Terrorism. I'm going to risk life and limb to make the presumption that the F.B.I. want to be able to access the data of known or suspected criminals and not just everybody including, but not strictly limited to my Nan who; unless she has been secretly wiring her pension funds to Al Qaeda is of no more interested to the Bureau than her rants about the youth of today and their taste in clothing and music are to me!

With at least parts of that in mind; to bring some relevence to my scene I decided to bring along one of my many commendeared pieces of signage; this one with the greatest of irony warns thieves of new crime-preventing technology!

Today's location was also chosen with some consideration of my news story; a dark, somewhat clandestine industrial building under lights after the darkness of night has ensconced (alright Thesaurus, that's enough from you!) all around. I felt the unavoidable inclusion of my own shadow from the bright light illuminating the scene actually aided the criminal element, my shadow imposing on the scene like a miscrient youth on the elderly at a bus stop ...

Day II

After a weekend, several trips to Wilkinson and just a little bit of pain and effort, the door is now a lot more mobile with the addition of the trucks, wheels and bearings (I'll use the deck for something else) from a cheap skateboard, as well as some castor wheels. This opens up a new world of possible places to cart it off to, so although I didn't take any new photographs, I was doing some work towards my project over the weekend ...

Today's headline again comes courtesy of the Daily Express, largely through a lack of choice of headlines not involving either Madeleine McCann or Big Brother and because this little snippet of Conservative Xenophobia is a great example of bias and influence in representing the world. If you think Newspapers excite me too much, you should have seen what I was like playing 'Daily Mail Danger' ... it was like extreme camping - In Tents! Anyway, our headline to strike fear into the heart of any Britain who truly cares about the state of the nation is: "Britain to build 2 million homes for migrants."

Today's location doesn't exactly reflect the brave new world of possibilities made available by my weekend work because it is in fact just outside my halls and down the street a little. Must take the idea further ... literally.

Day I

Cutting a long story as short as I possibly can: A friend once painted a picture on a door. I came to Nottingham and saw this door stood in the barest remenants of a building and meant to take a picture of it for her. Went to do it, they were finishing demolishing the building. Went back later, stole the door. Have since planned on taking it various places and photographing it here, there and everywhere.

How it's being used to 'Represent my world' is as follows: I am very interested in current affairs and politics as well as the media representation of such issues and how this shapes peoples view of the world. I'll be taking a newspaper headline from a national daily newspaper and painting it on my door before wheeling it out into the world.


Today's news headline comes courtesy of The Daily Express and tells us that: "Bin tax will hit everyone ... Unless you are an MP".

The location is my room here at University. This isn't due to my laziness, although the stencilling and painting did take three hours and as yet, I have no way of moving it so, that is a lesser factor. I thought that given that this is my world we (by we, I mean I am) are representing here, that my room with all my worldly posessions was as good a place as any to start.