William Claxton

One of the sad aspects about admiring older styles of photography, and coming to this appreciation only recently, is that I'm often unaware of famous photographers until I read their obituaries. William Claxton, for example, who died this week aged 80, and who was best known (I now learn) for photos of jazz musicians and film stars.

He had that wonderful ability to improvise the situation and the light. When I was reading about him in The Guardian and looking at his photos - bearing in mind they were taken in the late 50s - I did wonder if he'd been using a Leica. And so it would seem. That's him in the mirror in the photo here of Dietrich. You can't really see it in this wee jpeg, but the from bigger version of the same picture in this morning's printed Guardian, I'm pretty sure that's a iiif he's holding.

So, we have the technology... Now I just need to be in the environs of someone with Marlene's bone structure, smoking a cigarette. Which is the crux of the biscuit: I didn't have a Leica in the days when I went to parties where everyone was smoking all kinds of things. Now I've got one, and I'm a 100% nuclear family bloke. Such is life.

I sold the FED2 and Kodak 66 on eBay - foolishly underestimating the cost of postage, but getting more than expected in the final bids so it's san-fairy-tab-nabs. This means the Summitar 5cm f2 fund has had a bit of a boost. I should be able to afford it by Christmas, without causing any domestic disharmony. Then, I just need to get some invites to some parties with famous and attractive people smoking cigarettes, and that'll be me.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Leech or flatworm? Ants and Swiss Chard

Image
For the 2nd time in a week or so, (1st time regarding dwarf beans ), I'm following Alys Fowler's advice, this time with regard to Swiss chard .  Long story short, after midsummer plants which often bolt if planted in spring will resist the impulse to do so, probably because of shortening days; (I say shortening, but in Glasgow, in July, we're still getting 18 hours of daylight).   I got a packet of Bright Lights , at a good price, (another reason to wait until July before sowing, lots of bargains, I've noticed). But where to sow them? Most of the 2nd bed is under a tarpaulin, but it wasn't quite big enough to cover the whole bed, so the last 5ft or so went under a sheet of plastic, (in the background of the photo in this post, here .) Transparent plastic was a foolish idea, weeds were growing underneath it, so I covered most of it with sheets of metal from the old shed. I decided to leave the tarp, but use the area beneath the plastic for the chard. Who-ah there...
Read more

"Chevy Chase. Fuck ever happen to him?"

Image
As Paulie Walnuts said in The Sopranos. It got me thinking. As it happens, he's been working steadily , but you can see what Paulie means. It's like that with film and television actors: you don't see them in anything for a year or two, and you wonder if they're dead or perhaps on a lengthy charlie and booze session. Or maybe doing proper acting on the stage? Only appearing on the telly gives them meaning to us. That video with Paul Simon was on one of the cable music channels the other day. It always makes me smile. As for Paulie and the rest of the crew, the clock's ticking. Of course, America already knows how things finish, but we don't. My mate Ian was telling me about a friend of his, visiting the States a few weeks ago, flicking through the channels in his hotel bedroom, he hit on a repeat of THE final episode, just beginning. What a quandry! He watched it, as it goes, but kept shtum when he came home.
Read more

Sex Sells Cars

Image
That's my mate Stewy, who nowadays mends really expensive hospital equipment when it goes on the blink. But years ago, he had a modelling contract with Lada cars. I think it all ended badly, for him and for Lada.
Read more