Blue Rope – Two Blue Buckets

I bought a copy of Two Blue Buckets – Photographs by Peter Fraser (Cornerhouse Publications, Manchester, 1988) this week.  I remember seeing it at the Cambridge Darkroom when it was first published, but it didn’t resonate with me then.  At the time I was much more interested in black and white documentary and landscape photography and didn’t get this ‘kind of poetic colour photography – a photography of ideas’ that threw together apparently random images.  Curiously though, the title and the picture on the front cover (the eponymous buckets) stuck with me.

Another book that has stayed with me is The English Sunrise by Brian Rice and Tony Evans (Chatto and Windus, London, 1986).  This explores in colour the use of the Art Deco sunburst motif on buildings, furnishings and a wide range of products.  The pursuit of a single subject distinguishes it from Two Blue Buckets, but both revel in that which is often overlooked and both are ‘characterised by a bold coming to terms with the potential of colour to elucidate a chosen theme, subject or place’.

It has taken me a long time to catch up.  My gloves project (One Cold Hand, 2010 and Another Cold Hand, 2012) and the exploration of mannequins (Mannequins – A Strange Parade, 2017) follow loosely the example set by these books.  The ongoing Blue Rope project is perhaps more closely related to them.  A recent visit to the Cambridge University Botanic Garden reminded me that I’ve neglected this subject – no blog posts since March 2014.  Time to revive it.

Photos: Cambridge University Botanic Garden, February 2017

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