33 thoughts on “john gladdy – untitled”

  1. david alan harvey

    Editors note: i pulled this last comment from John under “On the Streets”…i thought this might prove for interesting discussion following his comment re: the Cary Conover essay….cheers, david

    John Gladdy
    February 6, 2009 at 6:41 am Edit

    ALL.
    Really interesting discussion. From all sides as has already been said. I enjoyed the essay a lot. The form was, although nothing new, something new, if that makes sense. I agree and also disagree with much of what has been said above, and while I am too lazy to go back through the debate and pull individual quotes to respond too, I would like to add my position to this.
    I lived that way for a long time, an animal among animals. Bought down to the basest of levels by MYSELF, as much as by [my perceived] failure of the world to care. I feel I earned the right to my position, the position I take now, by payment, in full, of death and suffering and humiliation, etc.. etc.. ad nauseum. If you have not been in ‘The Life’ then you have not, and any amount of outrage, book learning, liberal posturing, humanist philosophy, will NOT get you to a place of understanding it. Caring, sure; helping, sure, all the good things people do can help. But I can never help wondering just WHO it really is helping. Mainly the guilt response of the person themselves is my belief.[ there are many many honorable exceptions here]
    PANOS , as usual, is really quite poetically elegant in his vitriol, and while I disagree as much as I agree with what he has to say, I love that he has his ‘position’ too.
    Okay so what is my position on this?
    I make pictures. Its what I do. Anything can be a picture, most things have been. I DO NOT CARE about the things in the picture, only the picture itself. A homeless junkie, a sunset, a lone flower peeking through the snow…my father dead on a slab in the morgue. All these and many more find themselves in front of my lens. They are not real, in any sense, when I push the shutter. They are a collection of angles, colors and light, that somehow make a mirror for me to see myself in afterwords. I guess I sound like a monster[ you might be suprised]. Two of our homeless people around portobello road have died in the last 12 weeks. They had names. David and Lisa. I guess I was one of only a handful of people round here that knew that, or REALLY gave a shit to find out. We fed them [when we could], gave them bits and pieces of money[ when we had it to give], but above all were NEVER ashamed to talk to them AS PEOPLE. Even when one would stroll into a resturant as I was eating at, stinking of piss, and ask for some money, a cup of tea. I did, and do that, because i remember how much i needed a cup of tea, and a bit of change when I was them. I also took pictures of them whenever I could. Shamelessly, without permission. Not for money, not for good causes, not to salvage my soul ; but because under certain conditions they made good pictures. I see no contradiction here. Im sure many will.
    Peace
    John

  2. Paul O'Mara

    The complexity of why to document is eloquently and starkly described above. For me it is almost embarrassing to respond. Perhaps if one head is turned then it is a worthy project, even if imperfect. David this sort of dialogue is why Burn is so important. Thank you.

  3. bobblack

    I have LOVEd this portrait since the first time I clicked on John’s website (discovered here when he first commented)…and i love the intensity and the honed-bone bit honesty of all his portraits…of course, my first response was: fuck yea!…like the giacometti’s work in the old age home or peterson’s work on drunken-stoned time…

    and nothing to add to what he wrote on the last essay….

    a carnivorously authentic and, above all, real…

    i am so happy to see John’s work here…

    big ups

    bob

  4. panos skoulidas

    Yep!!!
    I’ve seen that photo before…
    It looks iconic…
    Somewhere in Roadtrips maybe…
    Anyway..,
    Loved it…
    No sarcasm… But this
    is exactly how I felt when I
    watched the previous essay..
    Laughing..

    Great Shot…
    ( the grinding teeth, the piercing eyes…)
    Right on
    So alive..
    I wish I could make portraits like that..
    Peace..
    ( waking up somewhere in EUGENE , Oregon…
    What the hell am I doing here???
    Haikkkkkk time to wake up…800 miles left to drive..
    We can do it…)
    peace and hugs…

  5. Asher

    JOHN: Great photo(s), eloquent comment- puts me to shame (in a good way)- even more eager to get out and shoot more, further engage with my subjects.

    I can’t help relating all new work I see with prior work that’s influenced me: This portrait brings to mind Eugene Richard’s photo on the cover of his book “Cocaine True Cocaine Blue”.

  6. Herve

    Here’s the type of shots that always brings me personally back to the fact that photography will always be about ONE photo, ie. one at a time, and one for all times as well. There are exceptions of course, but their very greatness, in its rarity, tend to proverbially confirm the “rule”.

    Witness all the essays proposed to be discussed here and on Road trip. people invariably seem to select their favorites (#3, $12, and #21 for me….)

    I dunno, it does not make any sense I guess, but it’s as if a photo is about photography and an essay is about a photographer, from which we go back to photography by looking singly at every shot. Quite the opposite of literature. Maybe I am wrong…

  7. wendy

    like the use of negative space in this one…
    and his expression..
    makes me want to push his chair…
    and enter his world….
    I find all your portraits to be strong..
    love the medium format…
    its nice to breathe…
    after yesterdays comments….
    quite a contrast..
    I feel your connection..
    **

  9. wendy

    I think a strong photo essay
    is something ‘bigger’
    than the photographer…
    perhaps ‘larger’
    than
    the photos themselves….
    perhaps?
    **

  13. tom hyde

    Pleased to see this work here. I go to see John’s work often because it’s so real and raw, stripped down bare and naked with no apologies, no CV, artist statement, no pretension. It’s just what it is like the people in them are who they are, really are, like the man above. John’s work is so obviously an honest mirror and it just gets right to it, from the inside looking out, photos that only John could take.

    It reminds me of the young reporter who went to interview the old guy in the wheelchair. As they are in the hallway of the home, the reporter is asking all the stupid pat questions, being a patronizing fool, and the old guy finally looks up with narrowed eyes and says, “fuck you.” I got it. I remembered.

    Peace be with you John.

  15. Andrew

    This is a powerful portrait. I can’t tell if the subject is showing anger, despair, or pain (or all three) but the intensity is all too evident. I love how it’s framed and how the only details are in the guy’s face.

    Deeply affecting – it’s been branded into my memory …

  17. Mike R

    Reminds me of Bruce Gilden: get behind the snarl and you find the person.
    My first reaction on seeing this photograph was to look at John’s website; I wanted to know more. I didn’t find any answers there – just photographs. I don’t subscribe to the just-show-the-photographs school of thought: this is fine for the photographer, who has intimate knowledge of the time and place of each click but not-so for the viewer, who may have no understanding of the lifestyle of the photographer or subject.

    I’m so pleased that David moved your post, John, because I missed it in the melee. “A homeless junkie, a sunset, a lone flower peeking through the snow…”? All I see on your website are photographs of people. I’m pleased to see people, you obviously care.

    I would so much like to see your story in photographs; obviously you can’t show yourself; but vicariously, through the lives of others. I’m drowning – not waving. We are all equal, we just don’t recognize ourselves asleep on the sidewalk.

    Thank you,

    Mike.

  23. Uchujin

    Jon is one of my favorite photographers on Flickr , which is where I first discovered his work.
    This shot is incredibly powerful, like a lot of his work.
    Keep it up Jon, fantastic stuff.

  24. herve

    Absolutely, Wendy, yet very few photographers who have achieved greatness are remembered in the end for the totality of an essay (which is not a book, even with a single theme, btw). Richards and Franck do come to mind, where the single-minded totality takes precedence over the single shot (by design/authorship).

    Anyway, it’s been an ongoing reflexion, the tyranny of the single shot in the history, not so much of the medium, but its public perception.

  25. john Gladdy

    Thanks everyone [and to DAH and burn] for having a look at this. There have been some questions raised that I really should answer, except that I am not going to. I dont know any of the answers. And if I tell you what it is to me, that will surely affect what it means [or does not mean] to you. I think that is the whole point of this series.
    Other work must have other motives; the rock and roll stuff i do, for instance, is simple and to the point. Like the music it aims to represent. No secrets there. Staight down the line [attempted] iconography. Visually arresting[sometimes, hopefully :)] and throwaway at the same time. ironically it is the genre in which i have the closest thing i have to what might constitute an ‘essay’. 3 years worth of footage from a single band/ artist, all sitting in the film/digital archive waiting for a reason to exist as a whole.
    What i will say is @patricia—You may well be right. @matiokawa—what do you feel he is feeling???
    @david– thank you for over-riding me and putting my little rant from the previous thread with this..You were, after all, right.
    Peace
    john

  29. matiokawa

    Well, I can see the feeling being captured, but when I look at pictures I like to know the behind the scenes. To get more involved with the topic. I don’t think your intention is just to have a powerful image but to show who he is and why in this particular moment he feels this way.

  31. Gracie P

    although i hear what john is trying to say (very loudly), i feel no guilt about leaving the homeless people alone. each time i “dole” out, i often ask myself: “why them? why not my family?”

  32. John Gladdy

    Gracie. I guess because your family already has people who give a shit, who care enough to go the extra mile for them. Lots of people dont. And what does it cost? five minutes time to MAYBE help someone remain in touch with humanity. Glad you feel no guilt though. I mean, Why should you? You could never be them right?
    PEACE
    John

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