Have I fallen down a worm hole or some other time shifting device ?
I’m awaiting the alarm from the clock but it is not going off , my instinctive survival alarms are going off but this is’nt a bad dream , this is the reality of 2022 and my sense of De ja Vu is tangible , my local shop IS playing the Tom Robinson Band , 2, 4, 6, 8, Motorway on the radio , Nena is singing Red Balloons on the telly and the Government has just announced a budget that is not a budget , the pound is weaker than a Tories resolve to resist a bung and Thatcher-esque policies are making a come back , this is 2022 !
“Leveling Up” has been leveled and trickledown is being rerouted and seen for what it realy is , a flow of capital upwards towards the kleptocrats !
The Department Of Budget Responsibility has been silenced and has not been allowed to comment on the UK’s latest roll of the economic dice as this budget , is not a budget , it’s a “fiscal event” , we are witnessing the last corrupt hurrah of a government that is bankrupt morally and financially …
The latest incarnation of casino economics feels like last orders in the “Last Chance Tory Saloon” , the posh lads are trousering what they can while they can as the rest of us look on , awaiting the bill…
Why do I mention all this stuff today on a Street Photography blog ? Well I’m hoping to inspire some of my “Socially Aware” readers into action , the last time the UK felt and looked like this turned out to be “The golden period for British Photography” in my view , Parr was at the top of his critical photographic game , Killip was photographing the deindustrialisation of the nation and Paul Graham was discreetly documenting unemployment offices , admittedly its going to be harder gig this time around but the hardship and division will be real enough …
The photography of those times was reflective of “The Time” , Lets not forget Sirkka-Liisa Konttinen’s Byker project which was a deep photographic study of the dismantling of a Community in the name of “progress” or Marketa Luskacova’s study of working class leisure time on the beaches of North East England , life might not be a lot of fun right now but the truth is that these dark days are a rare opportunity for those who can SEE past the bull shit to create work of significance , as a photographer you are in the right place at the right time to witness the historic impending failures of the UK state disguised as policy … .
The question is , will you engage with the here and now and depict what is going on or will you produce a few dead pan portraits of poor people and pretend to be walking the walk …
If your inclined to remain impartial & apolitical you could always photograph a bit of fruit , as life really is a bowl of cherries for some …
The world is going to pieces and people like Adams and [Edward] Weston are photographing rocks! Henri Cartier-Bresson.
MORE…
If your blessed with a bit more time feel free to visit highlights from my Another Day Off project , The State Of Britain series or The Testing Times pictures , they represent the most turbulent years in modern British history and ten years of my life…
Forty of my Foto What I Took Blogs are still available too …