Left to right: Martin Parr in lecture-series mode
Parr-inspired Royal Tribute by Will Reid iPad # Rozhall-selfie by Robbie Crace
creative An art department lecture day sees big- name artists reveal their inner secrets to an ‘uncomfortable’ Will Reid. Turns out playing show and tell is actually the creative process. T he Institute of Education sounds like a draconian corporation in a dystopian world akin to the one described in 1984. But it’s here, in a slightly Robbie, truth be told. I have been a fan of Parr’s work since before I got my first camera when I was 14: the blend of quirky compositions and gentle mockery of British culture that can be seen within his work
tatty-looking Sixties building next to Russell Square, where an annual series of talks and lectures by artists is held with the intention of ‘exploring and investigating The Creative Process’. Personally, if I ever make it as a semi- (or reasonably) successful artist, I’m not sure if I would feel comfortable giving one of these talks. My creative process is exactly that: my creative process. It is the secret formula, the method I use to make my work my own. If I had become known for a certain style I wouldn’t want to tell a room full of 300 art students and potential future rivals how to do it the way I do, partly because they would undoubtedly see how simple it was and partly because a lot of them would almost certainly be better at it. But evidently the speakers had more confidence in their craft than I would, and this was especially true of Martin Parr. If anyone tries to emulate Martin Parr’s style of ‘staged snapshot’ photography, everyone would react to it by saying “they’re just copying Martin Parr’, or ‘that looks like something Martin Parr might have done”. He owns that specific “creative process”. Martin Parr was the reason I decided to go to this day of talks with fellow Dulwich art students Josh and
always make for enjoyable viewing. I was hoping he would shed some light upon how he decides to photograph his subjects in the way he does – how he can simultaneously create a pastiche of Britain and images that so brilliantly represent it all within the same frame. He is the bastion of wonderfully self- aware tacky photography, and it would be interesting to get some deep insights on the convictions behind his work. ‘I really like collecting trays,’ he said, opening his talk. Ah. As the auditorium erupted with laughter I worried that maybe this wouldn’t be as in-depth as I was hoping, if he was going at it from a comic angle. But this, of course, was just his way of easing into an explanation of his love for all things kitsch and novelty, his way of explaining how he grew to love the things he mocks in his saccharine-saturated portraits of British life. ‘I create a fiction out of reality’, he said, ‘the easy bit is picking up a camera and pointing and shooting. But then you have to decide what it is you’re trying to say and express.’ This is when I properly realised Parr’s genius. While his photos may look like bad tourist shots taken on a compact camera by a
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