Applied Science

I’ve been trying to write a blog post for a while now but nothing comes out. Guess I don’t have a whole lot to say these days. I’ve seen a couple of movies, listened to a bit of live music, went to a museum and that’s about it. I meet up with friends in Utrecht every so often and try to house sit for friends as often as I can. What I do do with my time? Good question. Work, putting myself out there, trying to build contacts, relationships and get work. And run. I should say “jog” though as I have the speed of a turtle. I ran 7.2 kms the other day though:)  

 

OK so… on the downside I learned that I won’t be taken part in FotoFestivalNaarden and that the editors at Hollands Diep (magazine) really like my photography but that Cape Town is too far removed from their reader’s perception that they said “no” to my work regardless of liking it. I have come up with half-baked ideas about working in Dubai as I thought it would a great place to make some money fast. Friends of friends that live in Dubai have been very kind and helpful in providing me with information and sharing their experiences, but I guess I should have thought about it more before I opened my mouth.

 

Oh and I really hate the foam that floats on top of Senseo coffee. Come to think of it, I hate Senseo coffee.

 

On the upside, however, I have sold a few landscape images to a new design & art shop. They will be using these images as wallpaper on their site linking back to my own website. Kind of like they do on the WeTransfer website, I suppose. Right now the guys are focussing on getting the online store running but they aim to have a proper art gallery someday in the near future. I finally finished a 50 year wedding anniversary shoot about a week ago, and the guys at a copy writing agency have linked me successfully to a new client and I will be shooting 6 portraits for them. The idea was that if I do the first shoot well, I get the next 5 as well. It’s for a bi-monthly in-house magazine and I am quite stoked to be doing this. And I have already been booked for 3 shoots next month. Nice:) They are all very different ranging from a corporate shoot to casting photos to a private couple shoot.

 

I met up with Ingrid from www.gosouthafrica.nl in Amsterdam last week and she was very helpful in providing me with contacts in SA and I *finally* forwarded some images from the Verity shoot to Hip Hop clothing. They were so kind in lending us clothes for the shoot and I thought they’d might like to see what we did. I also learned that Strato Wear and Verity Price will be using my photos for their newly designed websites and yay, miss S.A. Partridge will use one of my portraits as the back cover shot for her new book. All to be revealed later this year. Woop:)  Speaking of projects that will be revealed later on; an interesting proposal just popped in to my mailbox two days ago about showcasing my work in Cape Town and am very pleased to say that I am now officially a StoryTraveler. Very cool and I can’t wait to do a first project with them. It will have to wait till I find myself on the southern hemisphere again but still, very excited. You should check them out when you have the time. 

 

In the mean time I am applying for a position at Noorderlicht, a very cool international photo festival on documentary photography and I am still trying to come to an agreement regarding the two broken frames from my Swimming Upstream exhibition. I have sent countless emails and even called them last week. “We will get back to you and let you know as soon as possible”. Yup. Sure. Since December 2010. Nice.

 

So what’s with the list of what you have done, of yes’ and no’s? Who cares? I dunno. I guess I am trying to see if all those teachers and professors in my life were right. All of them always said I could go far if I applied myself and would just stop staring out that window. That magical window; where things happen, where I feel alive and where I am happy. I am hoping that while I am applying myself and logging those mythological 10,000 hours that are said to be needed to hone your skill, I am also secretly sculpting that one brick that will smash that window.. forever.

 

For once in my life I hope my teachers were right:)

I really like the new Alamo Race Track album, ‘Unicorn Loves Deer’. I tried to find a clip for the Black Cat John Brown song but couldn’t find one that I liked. Different one instead, The Killing

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A different time in space

A different time in space

 

If I was the melancholic type, I’d wish it was still that time in space but that’s a different story..

 

Yesterday. Kind of an odd day. I woke up to a very grey and wet Utrecht. Waking up in a new place is always a bit odd to begin with. You see, I am staying at friend’s place who’s on holiday in Jordan right now. I used to live next door to him (at this place: hello operator ) so everything is very familiar but not the same. And not mine. Anyway, it was the day of my first photo shoot and first job interview since getting back to the NL. I was hired by a copy writing agency to do a corporate shoot for an in-house magazine. The shoot was originally planned at a building site but seeing how the weather was utterly crap I decided to change locations. I felt a little out-of-place doing so as I’m not really in charge and the outside location had been approved by the 3 parties involved but hey, feeling a little odd is better than coming across as incapable ’cause everyone would have drowned during the shoot and the photos could quite possibly have turned out crap. So I changed locations and I am glad I did. The shoot went by quite fast and I had fun doing it. People were friendly and cooperative and it was nice telling people what to do again:)

 

 After the shoot I had to rush across town (on my bicycle, in the rain) to a school for a job interview. The interview went well but I am kind of hoping I don’t get the job as I am looking for something with a bit more weight to it. I have gotten another photo job for at the end of this month and that’s quite cool too. Am a little worried about not having received an invoice yet for FotoFestivalNaarden (the invoice comes *after* you’ve paid and entered the competition and basically serves as a confirmation notice). I hope they received everything in good order. If I don’t get in because they find my work not suitable that’s one thing but to not get in on administrative errors is uhm, *another*.  I also have to keep my eye on the S.I.P. deadline and start working on my proposal. I really do think I could do a good job on writing a reasearch paper on photography. Plus, apply for jobs on this side obviously. And there’s still the Itch submissions, and Mahala… and Hollands Diep.. And… 🙂

 

And I have a meeting with a fashion magazine next week and am quite excited by the idea. I don’t want to say too much as I am afraid to jinx it. Spurred on by the meeting though, I decided to take all the Swimming Upstream interviews, re-read, re-edit them and write one more general article on the Cape Town creative scene. I approached some young corporates in the creative scene to counter balance the interviews with the artists. I wonder what magazine editors, gallery owners or journalists have to say. So far I approached 4 people but only heard back from one so far, thanks Shani/The Imaginarium. Then again, I only asked people last night:)

 

So my question to you is, when you think about the Cape Town creative scene what springs to mind? Is there anything remarkable, odd or lacking? There is so much creativity in CT but what do you think of the quality of work that is produced? Should the local government provide for.. for what? Is there anything that Cape Town really needs?

 

 

A different time in space… I don’t know why that random remark gets to me so. Being back in Utrecht is a step back in time. Trying to get work here with work I did there so I can go elsewhere. I have one foot here, another there. Trying to connect the dots. I already know here my heart is as I know exactly where my mind wanders. Time. Space. I need both. Whatever. I’m here. My heart not. It’s probably a decision you make. But I did that in June ’09 already when I quit my job.

 

Like I said, time for more coffee.

 

 

 

 

Pinelands Left Foot Step Down

Yesterday’s was an awesome day of  shooting. A long day but an awesome day. I met up with Verity late morning and just made our way to the Hip Hop clothing factorystraight away. I had never been to Hip Hop and had no idea what to expect. Turns out the factory is above the {field office} in town. Cool. I like that place.

The pink curtains didn’t make me feel very confident about what we would find *inside* but man, as soon as you go inside it’s like you falling down the rabbit hole. Clothes, clothes, clothes. Green, red, black, yellow, grey, purple, checkered, stripes, flowers, embroidered, sparkly, see through, petty coated, long, short, shiny, it’s all there. It’s awesome. There were four racks of clothing we could freely chose from and if we needed any help, just say so. That’s another thing about Hip Hop, everybody is super friendly, helpful and enthusiastic about what they do. See, it really like falling down the rabbit hole and being twirled around by a smiling hare offering you a hoompa-loompa accompanied trip down the yellow brick road.

 

After about an hour or so of trying on outfits we made our way down to the {field office} for  some coffee and a sandwich and we were good to go.

 

The idea was to shoot at Oude Molen in Pinelands, find that hippie, trippy car or some broken down wall and just start shooting. While  driving around the place we spotted some old beat up bus in a vegetable pad and that seemed way cooler than the hippie, trippy car which also happened to be covered in shade and wasn’t nearly as cool as I remember. Beat up bus it is then. Or so we thought… The darn thing was behind a closed fence… Off we went trying to find somebody who could let us in. The bar lady? Nope. Some random guy? Nope. The horse guy then? Aaahhhh maybe. The horse guy could at least lead us to The Guy Who Could Let Us In If He Like Us. As soon as I heard the Guy Who Could Let Us In was also known as Opa Jono I knew we were in. And yup, we were.

 

So off we went, pretty dresses in our arms and a camera in hand. Opa Jono and the horse guy settled down nicely on a chair and watched us for a while but fortunately grew tired of it pretty quickly. We shot on, in and around the bus, trying out different outfits and poses.

After nearly two hours at Oude Molen we figured we’d done enough and headed home to the deep south. Relaxed a little bit at Verity’s house and decided it was a pity not to use that gorgeous black dress so should we maybe try for a few more shots? Hell yeah. Must have been around 6 o’clock already and the sun was slowly setting, the wind was picking and it started to get cold. We wondered around the wetlands for a while, took a few photos and called it a day. I say it was a fab day.

Oh yes, there a new The Bees album out! Awesome! Love love love The Bees. Every Step’s a Yes:-) Title … yes from The Bees ‘Octopus’ album….