Saturday, September 06, 2008


I have been through this avenue before but not in colour. I have written about Malcolm Parry's privileged view. He maintains that the masses look up and the few, privileged, look down. Everybody looks up at tall buildings. The very few who can, get on the roof and look down. It helps that Mr. Parry is very tall and he is able to shoot down with his camera. He is renowned in how his extra height allows him to capture gossip cleavage like no other in his profession.



I have my own definition of the privileged view which has nothing to do with height. A couple of years ago the Georgia Straight asked me to photograph three rock bands inside Bradley's (a downtown strip joint). Don't ask me why it was that the Straight wanted this. But I took it seriously. Everybody can see a stripper on stage. But few get a glimpse into what happens in the dressing room. I had to go through a few Italian named bikers before I got a green light for the photograph. This was and is indeed a privileged view.



When Helen knocked on the door of my studio, I opened to find her dressed in her mother's kimono. She could barely walk everything was so tightly put on. She then slowly removed layer by layer for my camera. It was slow enough that I was able to do it in colour transparency as seen here, in b+w and in b+w infrared.



These are my privileged view.

Helen

more Helen

and even more Helen