A Parallel Planets piece by Unknown
Hello, Charlotte! It’s great to have you here on Parallel Planets. Tell us a bit about yourself.
When I was tiny, I remember being asked what I wanted to be when I grew up and I said I wanted to be everyone; I suppose storytelling allows for that.
The photographic works featured on your website make consistent use of the monochromatic medium. Is it something you’ve been doing since you learned how to use the camera? Or is it something that you’ve developed through your photographic experiments and/or personal explorations?
There’s a magic to black and white. Somehow it feels like a more primal, immediate approach to photography. People say that for the first weeks of their lives babies can only discern blacks, whites and greys – so perhaps it somehow takes us back to a more semi-conscious state or early, dreamlike, discovery of the world.
You are a story-telling type of photographer and I am very curious to know about how you go about your creative process. How do you create photographs—from the conception of ideas to the execution of your thoughts?
Images pop into my mind which become the base of a world and a story… it’s like a thread you pull out and weave from I guess.
Your series, “In and Out of Space,” is wonderful. Tell us more about it. Why did you pick a Kubrick film? Is he a big source of inspiration for you (especially since the man was also involved in the movies and a masterful photographer as well)?
Thank you! This series was done as a homage to Kubrick to celebrate the fifteenth anniversary of his death. I was interested to send an astronaut to explore our past. The lonely futuristic figure lost in the ruins of an abandoned vestige of our history. As opposed to sending an astronaut into space I wanted to send the astronaut into our own past. I was interested in the juxtaposition between the astronaut, symbol of the future, symbol of Man’s ambition and power to surpass, and this totally decayed building of faded grandeur. Both caught up and humbled by the grips of time. Displaying the pictures in front of the In & Out Club in which they were shot allows for a fun take on the tarditional promotional boards in front of building sites which give snapshots of an ideal future – replacing them with surreal and playful glimpses in a re-imagined interior.
One of your series, “Stornoway,” is very unique as it is connected with time, space, and memory. What sparked you to make this set? Can you pick the most meaningful triptych from the set and tell us a very short story about it?
Named after a remote burgh in the Outer Hebrides, the exhibition chronicled a journey through Scotland. Each panorama was named after the specific time frame at which it was taken and carefully sequenced into large-scale triptychs, allowing the viewer to pick up traces of a story.
12 : 35 to 12 : 38
"The car bounced on the dark waves, resting from its two-day drive, as the Caledonian Macbrayne carried us towards the shores of Lewis. Crisps and tartan gadgets displayed against the rusty white paint of the ferry. A couple lads and lasses drinking beer. A slot machine with retro cards and cherries. And the deck. Washed by rain. Sea and clouds- a blob of all the greys. And finally Stornoway’s eerie silhouette as the cars, in slow procession of red and white lights, disembarked.
We’d escaped the storm of kelpies -the blue men of Minch- who lurked in the stretch of sea that now separated us from the mainland in search of sailors to drown and boats to sink. Our small car soon swallowed by the bleak flatness of this new land.
Darting through the cutting cold, across stretches of wet, golden sand, past the bobbing black heads of smiley seals, we reached a whitewashed thatched cottage, where we hoped to spend the night. Rows of bunk beds filled with giggling Scottish Grannies, armed with paint and pallets -an adventurous art getaway interrupted in its tweeness by two huge bearded and tattooed giants gulping down barrels of ale. That night we didn’t hear the Fairy Hound, only the belches and snores bursting out of deep forgotten guts.
As a crispy dawn creeped in, we wedged our way through the sleeping bodies into the wilderness of the Outer Hebrides. An infinite landscape of rocks and stunted bushes where, with no man made reference, we felt small and humble.
And then, there in the distance, wind-worn stones jutting from a hill, like a forgotten chess set. Tombstones with weathered names and marks of love huddled together, forgotten, leaning over one another, seeking comfort in their shared coldness. No nearby village, no nearby warmth, just an ode to remembrance offered to the moor."
How does analogue photography relate to your personality and your personal stories? Why makes film more “special” than digital?
The unknown. The magic. The mystery and the discovery of it. It’s a process and the result is uncertain and un-immediate. Being in the darkroom feels like connecting to the tradition of sorcerers and witches. Churning chemicals, making images under the red light of a small hidden room.
Which photographers (living or dead) do you admire the most and how do their works influence yours? What other things, places, or events inspire your style?
So many! Diane Arbus, Guy Bourdin, Francesca Woodman, Man Ray, Dali, Ansel Adams, André Kertész, Claude Cahun, Cocteau, Picasso. Humour, surrealness, thoughtfulness, any endeavour to reinvent the world.
To you, what makes a photograph beautiful and worth keeping?
A subtlety, an intimacy, a moment in time…
What projects are you currently working on? Aside from photography & screenwriting, what other creative pursuits are you interested in?
I’m currently working on a new series of images for an upcoming show, writing a script for Quad films and working on a feature to direct.
Poetry, pottery, furniture, stained glass, books, sleeping…
If you were to pick 3 for each, what are your all-time favourite books, films (cinema), and songs? Perhaps share with us those that strongly reflect on your works.
The Bell Jar, As I Lay Dying, The Invisible Man.
Three Colours Red, White and Blue; Repulsion; The Shining.
The Red army choir’s –Black eyes-; Nina’s Simone’s Ne me quitte pas. Come on Eileen by the Dexys Midnight Runners
In this planet that we're thriving in—
What is your power animal?
Tortoise – because they look like dinosaurs and seem connected to beginning of time.
Who is your alternate ego?
Friedrich Nietzsche – because he had the best typewriter.
In an alternate universe where photography does not exist—
What would you be doing instead?
Singing opera – because it would be fun.
What would your name be?
Bianca Castafiore – that’s if the opera took off!
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