Fydell House, Boston

click photo to enlarge

I don't watch a great deal of television so my observations on the medium are not as well-informed as they might be. However, it's my feeling that one of the mainstays of recent years - the house makeover programme - seems to be in fairly steep decline. Apart from the grinning presenters with their mock bonhomie and ill-timed, over-exuberant hand gestures, can there be anyone who is lamenting the passing of this drivel, the audio-visual equivalent of food bulking agents?

Unfortunately the pressing need to find programme formats to fill the ever increasing number of channels means that equally tawdry replacements are already filling the airwaves. As I scan the listings looking for the odd film or two I come across such titles as The Great British Bake Off, Come Dine With Me, and Jedward Let Loose. The synopses of these programmes suggest they are every bit as mind-numbing as those they replace, and to call their underlying ideas threadbare is to imply that there was something of substance that has been worn out in their gestation: the fact is they are completely bereft of any redeeming features. And then, lurking in the listings, sandwiched between the soaps, I came across what must be the successor to the house makeover series. It is called DIY SOS, and as far as I can make out involves "experts" helping a DIY householder who has ruined his property (perhaps by following the ideas in an earlier house makeover programme!) to put it to rights. Televisual tripe it may be, but even I can see that the concept is brilliant: you devise programmes to encourage viewers to trash their houses whilst thinking they are making improvements and adding value, then you come up with another series that shows these poor saps being helped to sort it all out.

I was reflecting on these things as I photographed the staircase of Fydell House, Boston. This early eighteenth century building, possibly by William Sands of Spalding, is one of the town's finest. Its main staircase has walls and ceiling decorated with plaster moulding and stucco panels and it is lit by a tall, arched window. It occurred to me, as I gazed at the two hundred year old decoration, that doing a job well and sticking with the original design long enough for it to have passed the point of being "out of fashion" and to have become plain "old", is much better than frequent cheap makeovers designed to show how up-to-date you are. I used the LX3 for this photograph, and applied a sepia tint to a black and white conversion.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 5.1mm (24mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f2
Shutter Speed: 1/60
ISO: 80
Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Power, politics and PR

click photo to enlarge
A long time ago I heard Tony Benn, a Labour MP, remark that in politics it should be policies, not personalities, that are important. As the UK's general election campaign has followed its course over the past few weeks that thought has resounded in my head more than once.

The US-style TV "debates" featuring the leaders of the three largest parties have, in my view, been an unmitigated disaster for British politics. They have trivialised it in an entirely predictable way. The news media's headlines after each of the three events were all the same,"Who won last night's debate?" Why any rational, intelligent person should think that a matter of any importance is beyond me. The qualities necessary to make a presentation and to answer questions on TV are not those required by people whose job it is to formulate and implement policies that will take a country forward. There are those who believe that the character of the person leading a country is important. It is, but we are never going to know very much at all about the true character of our leaders. On TV and elsewhere we will only see that which the PR people, "handlers", managers and others show us (gaffes excepted). One would think that the example of Winston Churchill would resonate for the British. He has been variously described by biographers and historians as a drunkard, a mysoginist, a racist and much more. He was excellent with a prepared speech, but would have found a TV debate much more difficult. Yet, for all his failings, he clearly had the personal and political qualities necessary to steer the country in its darkest hour.

It seems to me that too many of the voting and non-voting public come to their decisions on the basis of flim-flam - "it's time for a change", "I don't like what this government has done for the last 5 years", " I like the sound of him". How many, one wonders, have read the election manifestos of the contending parties? How many have compared the policy proposals? How many realise that the best we can ever do is cast our vote for the least worst option! Perhaps my condemnation of these debates is excessive. As I write this piece most of the votes have been counted, and the party of the person widely judged to have done best on TV hasn't improved its standing. Maybe the British public treated them like "The X Factor" except that they didn't flock to the stores and buy the records!

What has any of this to do with my photograph of a London office block? The answer is "power." Looking at the image it reminded me of the cinematic cliche whereby a director wishing to emphasise the powerful, aloof nature of characters in business or politics, has the camera swing upwards to a gleaming, sun-lit office block with a grid of faceless windows. "But", you might be saying, "this block is in shadows". Yes it is, but that reflects my downcast demeanour at the probable outcome of the election. They say that people get the government they deserve. Well, I'm not aware of having done anything so awful that I deserve a government led by an ex-PR man who appears to be a political naif, and so lightweight as to be in danger of floating away in a cloud of his own hot air.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 11mm (22mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/250
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.7 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Political and architectural revelations

click photo to enlarge
There was great interest, general approval, and the sound of hands rubbing together at the TV networks' headquarters when it was announced that the leaders of the UK's main political parties would engage in three TV debates in the campaign run-up to the general election. From my house came a moan, followed by a groan. It seems to me that TV debates, where the politicians field questions thrown at them by a television pundit, is more akin to bear-baiting than serious politics. The capacity of a prospective prime minister to answer questions in such an arena, his ability to project an "image" that appeals to the public, and the extent to which he fails or succeeds relative to the others, says absolutely nothing about his fitness to hold the highest office in the land.

You can guarantee that a journalist, somewhere, will rate the politicians' TV peformances on the "is he the sort of man you'd like to have a drink with at the pub" scale of 1 to 10. As though that has a bearing on whether or not you should vote for him, or on how he might prepare a programme to take the nation forward over the next five years. Others, regrettably, will cast their vote according to how they come across on TV. Are they authoritative? Are they confident? Do they look the part? Can they speak in language that the man in the street understands? Do I like them? I've heard people say that they want politicians of integrity, dynamism, honesty, etc, and that these debates will help them make that judgement. Rubbish! We delude ourselves if we think that we can judge the character of a person through the distorting lens of television. No, the only thing that we can make a judgement on is the party manifesto - what they say they will do if elected - and then how they perform once in office. My feeling is that many people don't want to engage with politics sufficiently deeply to make a judgement of that sort, and will vote on the basis of "It's time for a change" or "I like him".

What has this to do with a house facade of 1691 in Hallaton, Leicestershire? Well, just as politicians' real motives and character are hidden beneath a veneer that they project to the world, so too are many houses. The first time I saw this building it was under a layer of foliage. However, I later came upon it in March when the thin veil of branches of Virginia creeper(?) only partly masked its simple, symmetrical face, and its true age was revealed . The main elevation is of a time when the seventeenth century had begun to turn towards Georgian. Its windows, in particular the single mullion dividing each into two "lights" betrays its pre-Georgian status, but the absence of transoms hints at a later date. However, the strict symmetry and stone window and door surrounds point to the next century. Beneath the creeper branches is not stone, but a layer of stucco, and under that the construction is brick. Another instance of a building hiding its true character.

What attracted me to this shot was the light reflected across the narrow street from the buildings behind me. It lifted the shade, put colour into the walls, showed the blue sky in the upstairs windows, and allowed me to position myself so I could be seen in the left window of the door.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 16mm (32mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/80
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Celebrity pig wrangling and documentaries

click photo to enlarge
It wasn't my intention to bang on about television again - I had something much more uplifting and positive in mind - but my breakfast table reading gives me no choice. Skimming the TV listings section today I noticed a picture advertising "Jimmy's Global Harvest" on BBC2. It showed a youngish, rather unkempt looking man squatting in a field holding a piece of grass. "Who", I thought, "is Jimmy?" A short synopsis revealed all. Apparently he is Jimmy Doherty, a celebrity pig wrangler, and he's going to discover "how the world's farmers will cope with feeding a growing population." Tonight, in the first of his four programmes he looks at the transformations that have taken place in Brazilian agriculture.

It's amazing how so little writing can provoke so many questions. The first is, "What is a celebrity pig wrangler?", and the second is "Should I care?" Then there's, "Why has Jimmy, out of all the potential agricultural experts, been chosen to present these programmes?" It couldn't be because the target audience knows Jimmy and the people who conceived the series think viewers are such saps that they can't give their attention to anything that isn't fronted by a celebrity? No, that coudn't possibly be the reason. There are more questions that come to mind about the dumbing down of television documentaries, but I'll spare you them, and say that I shan't be tuning in this evening. But then you guessed that didn't you? It's not that the subject isn't sufficiently serious and important. No, I shall give it a miss because for the progamme makers world food production isn't important enough to warrant serious treatment and be introduced by someone who is an expert in the field. Or perhaps I misjudge them: maybe, having watched Jimmy wrangling his pigs in a field, they imagine him an expert in every field of agriculture.

All of which has nothing to do with today's photograph of St Mary and the Holy Rood at Donington, Lincolnshire. On a brief shopping trip I stopped and snapped this late afternoon shot as the sun descended through the churchyard trees. Donington church is one of those that is extremely difficult to photograph from nearby. It suffers - from the photographer's point of view - by having large trees nearby. It also has a tower that acts as a porch and is attached to the south aisle. This is an unusual, but attractive, arrangement that Victorian Gothic architects sometimes copied. However, it makes it quite difficult to achieve a satisfactory photographic composition given the churchyard constraints. On this image I placed the church on the right, a row of trees at the left, and moved so that part of the sun was visible at the edge of the near trunk. I wanted it to add a warm note to a cold scene, and give something of a starburst effect, which it does, more or less.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 6.3mm (30mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f4
Shutter Speed: 1/800
ISO: 80
Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Dumped TVs and fanciful imaginings

click photo to enlarge
On a warm and sunny afternoon we had a cycle ride that took us through the flat Fenland landscape in the vicinity of Donington, Lincolnshire. In many areas of Britain the countryside starts to get a slightly unkempt look at the beginning of autumn. Not in the Fens however. This intensively farmed area receives constant attention from man and machine as crops are planted, tended, and harvested, at which point the soil is prepared for the next crop. And, since maximising output is the aim, just about every acre is well-tended and tidy.

So, as I cycled alongside a field where regimented ranks of winter wheat shoots were just starting to appear, you can imagine my surprise at coming upon an old TV resting upright on the carefully manicured soil near the road. What kind of low life would drive into the open country, open their car door and throw an unwanted television down the bank on to a field? Especially when the local council's "amenity sites" (waste dump) will receive and recycle such articles at no charge. Sometimes I despair of the selfish irresponsibility of my fellow citizens.

However, rather than dwell on the disfigurement of the countryside by the oaf who dumped this article I thought I'd see the discarded TV as an "opportunity", and took this photograph. Remembering Marcel Duchamp's dictum that anything can be art as long as it is taken out of context, it occurred to me that the unwanted television was a "ready-made", not unlike his bicycle wheels and urinals, and consequently I pronounce my photograph to be a work of art! I'm thinking that, if I can secure a sponsor to help me develop my theme then today's image will be the first in a series that will comment on the "the condition of mankind." My next image will have a man buried up to his neck in the field with his head inside the TV (screen removed), and arms sticking up to left and right. Then I'll move on to life-sized straw figures standing in the ripe wheat and caught in the act of hurling the TV at an oncoming combine harvester. Yes, that TV has definite possibilities... Or maybe not!

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 5.1mm (24mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f4
Shutter Speed: 1/800
ISO: 80
Exposure Compensation: -0.7 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Property and greed

click photo to enlarge

Just when you think TV can't get any worse it does! Three genres of programme currently fill an inordinate amount of UK air time. The so-called "reality" programmes full of mindless "contestants" doing mindless "tasks" are the epitome of dross that each season achieve the seeming impossibility of greater inanity. Then there's the various takes on cookery, each chef with their own pathetic gimmick, undertaking ever more ridiculous stunts in the interest of self-promotion. Jamie Oliver surely can't be far off a knighthood the way he's going. However, I don't think that's good enough. I'd like the pope to consider him for canonisation. St Jamie of Aga has a nice ring to it!

However, by far the worse of the televisual time-wasters are the property programmes. Those who conceive such viewing have clearly taken Gordon Gekko's "greed is good" creed to heart, and won't be happy until they've completely removed any notion that a house is for living in, and replaced it with the belief that it's simply an investment. How the BBC, with its public service remit, can support the selfish capitalism that underpins such programmes beggars belief. A significant part of the problem with housing in the UK centres around its use as an investment vehicle, as well as the activities of the growing group of avaricious buy-to-letters, urged on by this type of programme, who push up prices and ruin neighbourhoods and individual properties, all for their own selfish interest. Some of these people convince themselves that by buying a house and breaking it up into flats (to fund the loan they used to buy it) they're providing a public service! Surely such delusion is indicative of serious mental illness, and certainly shouldn't be fed by television?

As I walked past this sixteenth century house next to the fourteenth century church at Billingborough, Lincolnshire, I idly wondered what possibilities these programmes might dream up for it. Maybe they'd try and make it "more authentic" with a bit of "distressed" wood here and a slab or two of Cotswold (because it's the "best") stone there. Perhaps, taken by the genuine mullions, they'd reproduce them in all the windows. That would surely raise its price. Or would they make it multiple-occupancy (for the "discerning" buyer only of course) with a few more entrances knocked through its limestone walls. What they wouldn't do is leave it to grow old gracefully in the way it has done, slowly adapting to the needs of succeeding generations, because in so doing there's no quick profit to be made!

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 15mm (30mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/320
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: Off