The Land and Home

While I still have Pat Barker's book in my mind, I thought I would elucidate a little on another thread of visual imagery her writing inspired in me. There are certain British writers who are able to capture the essence of English life to the tea......I don't mean the twee cream teas and scones, Miss Marple vision of England, more that through their descriptions, and dialogue they give the reader (at least this particular reader) a real sense of almost being there yourself. I can smell the quality of air, feel it wrap about me, feel the dampness or the clarity of the day as a character steps forward through woodland lanes, or takes a day trip to the coast on a cold blustery day.  I am not able to explain it really, except to say that it all seems to be about the evocation of the unique atmosphere a country has. When I read these writings, my heart longs to be there, a strong response that is emotional and physical, revealing an unseverable connection to my homeland. It conjures memories, and wistful longing.

There are a couple of British photographers who came to mind immediately as I read certain passages: Fay Godwin, who died in 2005 aged 74, photographed the British landscape, capturing quintissential Britishness, both in the land and the characters who lived and worked on it. They are beautiful and mysterious, illustrating the sometimes bleak and barren topography of the UK. 

Beadnell Bay, Northumberland 1991

Path and Reservoir, Lumbutts, Yorkshire, 1977

Top Withens, Calder Valley, 1977

Social Security Office, Yorkshire, 1971

Between 1993 & 1996, Magnum photographer, Mark Power set out to make a series of images based on the locations of the Shipping Forecast, broadcast for seafaring folk four times daily on BBC Radio 4. The names of these remote lands, such as Viking, Cromerty, Dogger, Fisher, German Bight, create imaginings of enigmatic and romantic landscapes. The Shipping Forecast suits the notions of an Island Nation. Although many of these places aren't located off the coast of the UK, but other European nations like France, Germany and Iceland, in the images below of the northeast English coast, Mark Power has managed to capture that atmosphere I have been attempting to explain. 

Tyne

Sunday 25th July 1993

West or southwest 3 0r 4 increasing 5 or 6. Showers. Good.

Tyne

Sunday 25th July 1993

West or southwest 3 or 4 increasing 5 or 6. Showers. Good.

        

All this talk of my homeland has had me thinking about what it means to shift your roots from one country to another.  More than ever before, people are on the move, either by choice or necessity. Does your birthplace define you, in some way, and if that is the case, then does the nature of who you are change when you no longer live there?  It's an interesting thought, and one that I return to every now and again as I live my life away from my birth place, and my family, in a country full of immigrants. Jhumpa Lahiri, in my opinion a brilliant American author of Bengali descent, delves deeply into this subject in all three of her books, the most famous one being 'The Namesake', but 'Unaccustomed Earth' is well worth a read too. Her characters have usually emmigrated from India to America. This essentially seems to make for a melancholy life attempting to embrace American Culture as their own, and most often in the case of their children, who are commonly born in the USA, the struggle to connect with their Indian heritage and find their rightful place in America. Ultimately they can never disconnect with their roots, begging the question, where do you belong? There is a sense of neither here or there perhaps. I am fascinated my these ideas, and it has inspired the desire to explore further in visual terms this notion of belonging. 

"One cannot look at this. I saw it. This is the truth"

Prison Interior 1810-14 - Francisco de Goya

The Third of May 1808

Last night I finished 'Double Vision' by British writer Pat Barker (who also wrote 'The Regeneration Trilogy' ). It took me all of two days.....the book entranced me and has left me pondering on things photographic. Set in post 9/11 times, in a country village close to Newcastle, England, the story centers around two men, a writer and a photographer (now dead), both journalists who cover war zones, and tells of their relationship with each other and with those close to them. At the heart of the story is the ethical question of veracity and vision, of how the written word does not necessarily invoke total truth, but yet a photographic image tends to solidify the event, making it unquestionably truthful. This is what really happened. The main protagonist is writing a book about the ways wars are represented. In the following conversation with the widow of his friend, he describes why he felt compelled to write this particular book.

'  'I can even tell you what started it. Jules Naudet, the guy who was following a rookie fireman round New York on 9/11 and just found himself filming the attack on the towers? Well, something he said haunted me. At one point he turned his camera off - he wouldn't film people burning - and he said, "Nobody should have to see this" And immediately I thought of Goya.'

' "One cannot look at this"?'

Yes - but then "I saw it." "This is the truth." Its the argument he's having with himself, all the time, between the ethical problems of showing the atrocities and yet the need to say "Look, this is what's happening".....and I thought, My God, we're still facing exactly the same problem. There's always this tension between wanting to show the truth, and yet being sceptical about what the effects of showing it are going to be.' '

This is a moral dilemma, but the visual image is a mainstay in recounting the news of  the day and a necessity particularly when it comes to something as horrific as war or poverty. Until we can actually see the reality of war, it is somewhere over there, not here in our everyday reality, it can be rationalized or forgotten, it cannot touch us emotionally. The visual image before our eyes forces us to look, and reminds us of the responsibility we bear that stems from this newfound knowledge. 

Difficult as they may be to look at, I am thankful for the work of photographers such as James Nachtwey, who is the subject of an incredible film 'War Photographer', Marcus Bleasdale, and Alexandra Boulat, all members of  VII Photo Agency. Their work reflects entirely the scope of what it means to be human, to the darkest depths of humanity and back again towards hope, for there always has to some glimmer of hope.....it's the essence of life.

James Nachtwey. Chechnya, 1996  

James Nachtwey. Kosovo, 1999

Alexandra Boulet. Kosovo, 1999

"you can show war without showing a gun, and that's interesting, in just one photograph"