#garryowens

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We hope everyone had a fantastic #easter. #easteregghunt #easterbunny #bunnywithattitude Shot by #garryowens (at London, United Kingdom)

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T-Squat interview of Garry Owens, posted by James Watkins. Written by Helen Doick

GARRY OWENS 

If there was anyone you fancied knocking back a few pints with, whilst confessing your passion for sweaty men in lycra and chewing over the complexities of light and reflection, it would be Garry Owens. UK born and bred, lover of motorbikes, experimenting with fancy dress and good old-fashioned curries (post war British versions of course). His commercial work is every rev-head’s wet dream – shooting sexy major car campaigns, globally. However, Owens is far from your colloquial hooning car enthusiast.

He is in fact well turned out, and well versed in his creativity.

His path into photography was paved from the realistion of how rubbish he was at painting whilst attending art college. His fine art drawings lacked the desired aesthetic, and were likened to scribbles – harboring minimal, purist displays of the form. As lecturers tutt-tutted and shook their heads at cardboard sculptures, which he couldn’t remember the title or purpose of, Owens turned to photography and from there he shone like a beacon on the Welsh Mores.

Garry tells, “A friend of mine wrote to Patrick Litchfield and asked if we could go and visit him, he said ‘yes’. Patrick Litchfield was terribly famous, the renowned photographer who shot Prince Charles and Lady Diana’s wedding and was the 5th Earl of Litchfield. To those genealogists in the know, that means he was the Queen’s first cousin once removed". Patrick advised Garry and his pal to apply to Blackpool and Fylde College, Lancashire. The normally strict entry process was uncannily bypassed with the young artists being offered places on the spot – slipping Patrick’s name with a confident,"he’s a friend of ours".

“It was a ghost town in winter” - Owen’s most dominant memory of Blackpool was the amount of dog shit and rain there was. Apparently it hasn’t changed. Owens got really sucked into photography. Moving to London and working with Max Forsyth and Ray Massey, he speedily went it alone with his first photographic project. It was a momentous moment receiving a call from an art director. Whilst he stood to take the call – he took the brief and there it began, with a shot of asprinkler in a garden.

A couple of decades later, shooting 5 x 4 and digital, Michelin dinners with clients in Paris, mingling with advertising agencies in UK, Europe, US and Australia and exhibiting in galleries in Milan, we talk to the fine man of today.

Touching briefly on his impressive buffet of shimmering advertising photography, and focusing on his recent series of works; from back-alley bandits to the people of Tokyo. Garry Owens brings us ‘The Mask’ ‘The Wrestler’, ‘Sun City”, and ‘Tranquillity in Tokyo’. I asked Garry if as a sixteen year old, his stint as a tree surgeon had brewed a fetish for the Bonsai, he gave no answer.

garryowens.com

Words: Helen Doick.

What do you love about photography? Why did you want to become a photographer?

I love technology, I love making pictures and I love creating. It’s all within the finding ‘something’ and changing it into an image you wish to look at more than once. It could be a person or a tree, whatever. Then you add that magic to create an image that you and others will want to look at over and over. This image has been made by me, and will always be unique. No one else has created it. Yes, we can say everything has been done, but it hasn’t. Any photograph you see is completely indicative to that moment in time, it happens once. It’s an incredible feeling.

Why did I start to do this? I couldn’t paint or draw.

What motivated you to create ‘The Mask’ series?

Super hero comics as a kid. The characters are so defined, crafted and fantastical. I wanted to experiment with my own versions; I think they are far more believable.

How did you go about constructing the series? Did you have a clear plan or did you start with one thought and let it grow organically?

It grew organically. Sometimes I had an idea of a character I wanted to create and other times I actually looked for masks, coming up with an idea around it. Both notions seem to go hand in hand when I work. I use both ideas of organic form and clear structure. The series is not complete with characters still in the gestation process. I don’t think I can stop.

You have shot all over the world, in your eyes what is the best body of work you have created?

I would say this mask series. Sometimes you get tired of images that have been created but these I never do. I love them and I am proud of the work. Commercially, yes there are huge global campaigns I have shot, but they do not come from within me. My work is created solely by me; it feels like more of an achievement. It is not guided by anything but me and the journey it is destined to take.

Since creating this series, where has your creative path taken you? Are you still creating characters? Or are you shooting something different?

Yes I am creating characters. I’ve been hanging out with Mexicans and I am shooting urban landscapes. ‘Tranquility in Tokyo’ is the first project I wanted to do on urban landscapes. It was born out of a series I shot in Arizona called ‘Sun City’.

I like long-term projects but I also like short deadlines with myself. With a tight deadline you have to find the best of the scenario you have placed yourself in. With Tokyo it was fast paced due to timings and the essence of this city. I liked the spontaneity and the organic growth of the series. I knew I had to find quiet within the madness that is Tokyo, which as anyone who has visited knows, is pretty hard to find. Sometimes commercial work can get produced within an inch of its life, to deadline – it’s nice to find something you were not expecting instead.

‘The Wrestlers’ I knew I wanted to find, but I didn’t know how much they would live the fantasy that I thought ‘I’ would be creating. I love these Mexican grappling heroes. They make the Big Daddy and Giant Haystacks of the 80s look like a big girl’s blouse.

What compelled you to shoot your Wrestler series?

I was sat in a bar in LA, whilst shooting the Mask Series, on the wall there was framed drawings of Mexican wrestlers. It was like one of those sublime and deciding moments. I knew I had to make the trek to Mexico to shoot those guys. It was destiny. Nipping to the bar during an Elbow concert at the Round House in Camden there they were. On a poster the Mexicans were on their way to London in a travelling wrestler show. I blame my grandmother. We used to watch it every Saturday afternoon, the football results, horse racing with the highlight being the wrestling. Nan used to make me go down the Bookies (TAB) before the match commenced. I can still see her throwing her slipper at the TV.

When shooting commercially what do you specialise in? Is there a relationship between your commercial and personal work?

When shooting commercially I shoot cars, landscapes and portraits. I started shooting locations and landscapes, which led to automotive. The world outside of my head thinks I specialise in cars but I feel I am interested in so much, that I can’t be too specific – I love the interaction with people, discovering their lives. Shooting just cars you don’t get that integration, I guess I’m not a petrol head.

Relationship wise I have my way of looking at colour tone, composition, light, which would translate between the two, that’s if I am allowed to in commercial land.

When working in the commercial realm, how do you feel about the introduction of moving image? How do you think photography will be used and seen in the next couple of decades?

Commercially, it is inevitable for more moving image to be shot alongside photography. However, some photographers want to remain shooting their images, that moment in time. In a throwaway world, the image is what holds the moment, I’m going to hang on to the beauty of that.

Do you think your personal photographs reflect where you were at emotionally at the time of shooting?

No consciously, but yes subconsciously. Anyone creating something will have an emotional connection to their work, but you won’t be necessarily aware.

What advice would you give to yourself as a younger artist?

Stop thinking about it and do it. Never procrastinate. I’m always happy when I’m shooting a client project I never worry, but when I shoot my own projects I sometimes over-think, which can damage what I was trying to find interesting in the first place.

Can you tell us more about your Sun City series?

It was a location on a movie I had seen. To be honest I couldn’t believe it was not a set, but in fact a real place. I was in Arizona shooting Victory Motorcycles, so I took a day out to see this place. I wondered around and chatted to old people. It’s a retirement village. All cars were kept pristine in garages; I doubt the owners could see to drive anymore.

I chatted to a few residents; I think they were slightly suspicious of me until I wowed them over with my most ‘futuristic’ camera. I wish I had had more time and I would love to go back. To give a more in-depth story of life there, portraits of the geriatrics and what they get up to would play pretty fascinating series development. It is a gamble when revisiting a series, you chance whether it will be as good as you have imagined. I can play out scenes in my head that will never actually exist, I enjoy fiddling about with chance.

How do you feel about retirement villages? Would you like to live in one in your elderly years?

I can’t say the idea thrills me with delight, it seems a bit isolated. Imagine when you can’t drive anymore, shuffling to the pool to sit all day staring at Vera and Beryl in their floral one pieces. I think I would rather dress as Thelma or Louise and ride my motorbike off a cliff, than lose my dignity having someone wiping my ass.

As you say you love shooting landscapes. Where would you love to shoot (that you haven’t) and why?

I would love to go to the southern most tip of Argentina. I used to think it was the ocean I was drawn to, but in fact I think I like it more than I actually do. It’s the mountains and hills which inspire me (it must be my Welsh background).

What will we see next from you?

There are a couple of nude masked foxes I’ve been chatting to in my head lately.