A little while ago I wrote about my passion for second hand photography books and I shared a few of my favourites with you.
I have so many photobooks though (more an obssession than a passion perhaps) so here’s another one. This is going to be more of a deep dive into the book as I felt more drawn to this photographer. There was something about their work, their process and style, and their choice of subject matter which resonated very deeply with me.
As before, the book was discovered browsing through a second hand bookshop or charity shop (I am afraid I can’t remember which one in this case). I note that this book is also currently still available from the publisher, Silverhill Press
“From the photo-diaries of Mick Williamson”
Mick Williamson 2023
From the Photo-diaries of Mick Williamson
The project has been ongoing since the 1970s and has accumulated over two million photographs!
Mick Williamson is a professional photographer and educator. He first picked up a camera in the mid 1960s and started working in photography in the early 70s. As well as a photographer he has taught in various colleges and has served on numerous committees and boards. He has given to the art and craft of photography over his career.
The photo-diaries have been an ongoing project for him since the 1970s, around the birth of his son. He is an habitual and almost daily photographer (I understand that if he forgets to take his camera with him he will go back to get it – I know he feels!).
For this particular project he has taken over two million photographs! And it is worth bearing in mind he is using a film camera rather than digital.
I am fascinated by his work not just because of his breathtaking ethereal images but because some of his ways of working resonate with me. I have tried to a photograph a day as part of a mindful process to observe the world around me, although I am not always successful.
I have also been conscious of just how many photographs I have taken over the years. I have had a digitial camera for well over a decade now and I have no idea how many photographs I have created, most of which live on various hard drives and never see the light of day – just the quantity of photographs can seem overwhelming. Perhaps this could be a subject for another post.
Williamson has used the same camera for the whole project. His way of working with it has become instinctive.
As mentioned, Williamson photographs on a film camera. His choice was an Olympus Pen, a small half frame camera: that is it would take two photographs for each frame of a 35mm film. 36 exposures would become 72. He has used the same camera for many years and knows how it will work and what it will see. As a result his photography is intuitive. Very often he will take his photographs without even looking through the viewfinder. He tends to work in a very instinctive way responding to what he sees. He does not impose himself on his subject.
The driving force of the project was the birth of his son in the mid 1970s. I have never been a father but I could imagine how watching the moments of your child’s life could make you more conscious of each second and perhaps want to capture them. As mentioned in the introduction to the book his compulsion was “borne of a desire to seize the ever-vanishing seconds.”
His choice of subjects are from the everyday, a fleeting moment, through carefully composed landscapes.
Many of his images are of the domestic – cups of tea and pints of beer; chairs, tables and other everyday objects that have caught his eye. Perhaps it is the way the light falls upon them or simply giving prominence to something that is often overlooked.
Some of the photographs are more like family “snaps” of his children and friends on holiday and at play, although they are more than that. The ethereal quality of the lighting renders them as something more than a simple family photograph.
As with many ostensibly personal photographs some of the images can seem a little surreal to a third party. For example there is one image of hands holding a cup of tea, and in the background a hose snakes across a gravel surface and through a wooden fence. What is going on? A family photograph out of context?
Some of his images look like the quiet scenes from a movie.
Many of the photographs are displayed in a sequence as they were taken on the film with the sprockets and numbers visible. It is always fascinating to watch how a photographer comes to their chosen image. Somewhere in my collection of second hand books I have a copy of the book of contact prints from photographers working for the Magnum photograph agency – they show how some of the most classic images of all time were arrived at. In this case, though, Williamson is showing a series of moments for example curtains blowing through an open window in a hotel room, or a child walking around concentric circles drawn in the sand. It is almost as if they are scenes from a movie, perhaps a moment of calm between the action.
A lot of the photograph are taken at unusual angles and focus in on details, perhaps a hand holding a cup of tea. Many of the people in the images tend to be viewed from behind or from a distance or against the light, or perhaps just a part of them is visible.
Apart from the photographs of people and everyday objects there are also landscapes, typically of woods, lakes and mountains often under dark skies. These are the more formal images possibly where he has composed the image through the viewfinder. A longer moment recorded, they feel different to the instinctively photographed moments.
Above all there is childhood and a sense of fleeting moments.
Above all there is childhood. Running, playing often in sunlight. Throughout the images Williamson makes a great use of light. It flares and glows, casts shadows and ripples on water and through glass. As a result the photographs have an ethereal sense. There is a positive feeling of the moment captured but the glare of the light emphasises its transience and we are returned to the driving force for this project – to capture fleeting moments
Unlike many of the other second hand books I have collected this one is still in print (just!). You can purchase copies of it from the publisher, Silverhill Press.
This is the second of a series of posts on some of the second hand photobooks I have purchased. I hope that you have found it interesting and it encourages you to seek out photographers’ printed work in your local second hand and charity bookshops.
If you discover any interesting ones let me know in the comments below.