I’d been considering speaking to why I was working on a photo series shooting TRADESPEOPLE when a comment from a former acting agent of mine, 3 agents ago, prompted me to sit down, reflect and write. I don’t write much at the moment. There are a thousand things I ‘owe’ - letters to best friends, a pilot television script for fun, grant proposals - but time and inspiration are an elusive pair sometimes.
I am taking pictures though. A good deal of them. While I assemble a show I shot a couple summers ago I’m shooting something new - TRADESPEOPLE. People who work in the trades which is what I’m doing now. Renovating houses is a waystation on a map towards continuing to apprentice with wooden boatbuilders. My former agent’s response to finding out I was doing manual labour - THERE’S NO BUSINESS LIKE SHOW BUSINESS - suggested he figured I was doing it because I have to in order to work in show business. It’s a common refrain.
But I don’t work in show business anymore. Not really. I mean I sort of do in that I acted in a movie this past summer but, y’know, the experience of making Porcupine Lake was so unlike anything I’d ever been a part of - in a 30 year career - that it counts as something else. It wins another category.
We made something this summer. I, and a slough of other talented, committed artists, were material for Canadian filmmaker Ingrid Veninger to use to make her art. We were outside the system, working with a small budget, skeleton all they way. We ate together at night and slept on a compound. There were about 20 of us crew members. Everyone did everything. It was simply incredible. If I’m to work on the fringe of film and tv, in traditional or new formats, then it has to be on projects with similar goals and spirit. I’m all for that.
But I don’t think it’s show business when it’s like that.
The spirit I’m referring to is art making, both process and product, with integrity, intimacy, creativity and collaboration. These are things I’ve been striving for in my photo projects. This isn’t hard because they are embedded in the things I’m doing anyway - the kids, my job renovating houses, coaching minor hockey, a boatbuilding apprenticeship. I have found a way of making art out of my day to day so if I strive for a rich life then the documentation of that life should be rich too. So long as I trust my eye. Which I do.
TRADESPEOPLE is, as the title positively nails, a study of the people who work in the trades. I’ve shot others on my sites, self portraits on a few sites, and I’ve started receiving offers from subjects I haven’t worked with...yet (Ba dump dump, tradesperson joke). In the New Year I’m shooting Tony Nappo, a gajillion-threat artist, complete inspiration to me, and a house painter. I’m also going to shoot a ferrier!!! Don’t know what his art is yet. Maybe it’s not getting kicked in the head by a horse.
Anyhow...they are pictures of the people who build your homes and shoe your horses. They operate the crane that raises your condo, cut the pipe that delivers your gas, and get rid of the garbage you create gutting a Victorian to renovate. They also deliver your Ikea which, while not technically a trade, is definitely a part of the ecosystem.
They also pull the clog out of your p-trap.
I fell into this work and love it. The crew I’m on is an all artist crew. The bossman is the drummer of a very successful Canadian band and a talented visual artist. He takes off here and there to tour giving us all a chance to put some time into whatever we’re working on. Another fella is a world traveling trombonist who has played with everyone you can ever think of. We call him Tommy 4 Sandwiches. The fourth is a skilled craftsman who spends his disposable income on art work and travel. The atmosphere is highly conducive to creativity. We dance a lot. I love working with my body. It’s familial.
The subs come in and don’t exactly know what to make of us but they do let me take their picture. This is Jimmy Sparks. He is an old school electrician who was with us for a couple weeks. A week in he gave me a shitty old Black’s tripod. Because you’re a photographer, he said in his husky, Greek accent. I almost cried. It’s now my site tripod. It’ll get packed up after every job and transported with the hammers, levels, and saws to the next site so I can take pictures there too.
Jimmy Sparks, except for his love of Drumpf, a pretty classy guy. That’s why TRADESPEOPLE.
areudirty
theartofmadeline