Of Time and Place

[Pete Askew]

I"m not planning to describe this series. I'm just interested to see what and where they might be from.

Leica M9 + 35mm Summilux M f1:1.4. PP in LR, PS and Nik.

 

[Rob MacKillop]

Lots of great shots there, Pete. Love the curtains shot most of all, on first look. Love the overall tone throughout. Great stuff.

 

[Brian Moore]

You really do a great job of celebrating the banal and making it interesting, Pete. Love #3 especially,...I think because of the contrast between the strong light from the window and the black switches on the wall.

 

[Pete Askew]

Thanks Brian, thanks Rob. I think my favourite is the cherry 'curtain, with the pale blue wall behind. That piece of textile is at least 60 years old and pre-dates the house.

 

[Chris Dodkin]

Great series Pete - loving the theme continued through the PP

That wallpaper looks like vintage Vymura to me - it's so IN right now!

Is this someone's vintage man cave bar room?

 

[Pete Askew]

The party cellar, ca 1974.

 

[Paul Lange]

I find in interesting because it is so different from what you would have found in the UK yet in some ways many things are the same. It has a very Eastern Block look and feel to it with it's blend of decoration and utilitarianism.

 

[Pete Askew]

I know what you mean Paul and that is what draws me to these details. There is a series of pictures made by a young woman of the house of her grandparents where she spent a lot of time as a child (published in Ag+ a few years ago). She has taken loads of shots of details she remembered but all at the height as seen by a small child. The familiar to her presented to others but different also to how she now observes it herself. Maybe we should also record the things that are familiar to ourselves and see how different they are in abstraction or how others respond to them. These details are familiar to Ina and her family and many from similar backgrounds (they are pure West German, just unchanged from when the house was built in the mid 1960's) but are subtly alien to others. I find this interesting in itself but and also interesting in that when shown to those familiar with them, in abstraction, that they reveal stories and details - like the age and origin of the textile with the cherries on from the 1950's.

 

[Hamish Gill]

A lovely set Pete!
Very well captured feeling of the place...
I cant quite put work out what it is about all these shots that make me think of a film
you can sort of imagine a sombre feeling in a film, after something has just happened ... there is maybe some very slow slightly melancholic with a hint of "it will be ok" melody playing ...
the next shot after these would probably be looking down a long straightish road with no hedges on the one side but a row of pylons and this building on the left in the foreground ... it would be a grey day!
then a shot of a straggly dog on a grass verge ...
do you know the sort of film im talking about ...
It would be shot like "wendy and lucy"
(in case you havent seen it)
[video=youtube;7QXEK64ba08]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QXEK64ba08[/video]

 

[Pete Askew]

An addition to the series.

 

[Glenn Clabo]

Your unique eye and execution is fun to watch Pete.

 

[Beth Carter]

really interesting series, that first shot is a lot of fun.

 

[Pete Askew]

Thanks both. I do have a few more of these somewhere.

 

[Julian de'Courcy]

Nice set Pete. From a different culture yet the era does throw up similarities, one of these being the availability from mass production, which allowed the purchase of decoration that was previously not affordable, such as the printed, or anaglypta type wall paper. The cherry curtain as you say stands out, as does the curtain with pegs for me.
One thing struck as I opened the first picture, was the absolute symmetry, which carried throughout the set in one form or another but at times becoming much more chaotic.

 

[Pete Askew]

Thanks Julian. I do find these sorts of details fascinating and am a bit obsessive sometimes about symmetry!

 

[Hamish Gill]

I think these remain some of my favorites of all the photos you have posted on here Pete!

 

[Milan Vjestica]

Pete, somehow you have managed to make them 'of their age' too. Excellent work.

 

[Pete Askew]

Thanks Hamish. Thanks Milan. Yes, they are one of my favourite series as well. Probably because they sit well together and have such a strong resonance with me.

 

[Hamish Gill]

for me, they sit the best with your pp style ...