Bartolomy’s Diary

I am getting some prints made up to drop my book off as well pretty much right after that. Besides that I am supposed to meet Michael Czwinski, in Hackney Central but I wont be holding my breath to be honest as the meet has already been postponed three time. The discussion will be about the Design Museum project which we are doing, I don’t think anything will come out for at least another year if not more. What I have suggested to add on are the designer’s creations in some sort of special way, this of course will be quite an undertaking.

Here is a shot I took in Parco di Monza, just north of Milano, I completely forgot the model’s name, I know she was Danish and with Marcella’s Studio Agency in Milano. The outfit is Blumarine, Claudio Solfi used to let us borrow some clothes from the show room from Via Manzoni, damn it’s such a long time ago…….which brings me to Peter Gallina who has gotten it into his feeble brain that great fortune is about await him shortly by having moved from Milano to London, good luck pal, anyone who comes here while the country’s economy is in deep shit to make a good living ought to be commended.
Anyway the shot was a color slide which I turned to b&w instead, it is much more fitting.

Tonight Doll & The Kicks @ Old Blue Last, will take a few.

Wednesday I got a call from Liam Gleeson @ Notion regarding a party/exhibition for Havana Club Rum in Shoreditch (behind the Truman Brewery). A lot of artists had made their interpretation of the Havana Rum brand, a lot of it looked like an adaptation for Absolut Vodka campaigns over the years, a few pieces were fun to look at, and some were of a great quality but the majority swimmed in a sea of mediocrity. I took a few shots of the pieces and also of the artists with their works.

Terri and I got up at 4 am the next morning to catch the plane to Eindhoven from where we get picked up by Harry van der Brugghen, my former boss and mentor, and drove to his place in Vught where I went through a few boxes of old negatives to find some of my old lost stuff, sadly not one shot there, shame I was hoping to find a few missing gems.

From his place we get dropped in Den-Bosch and take the train to my mom’s place where we stay and celebrate her 73rd birthday. My brother Eric, his wife Monique and their children are there too, I take a few shots of them as well. My mom’s brother and sisters are there too, a jolly good time really.
On the way back by bike I take some scenery shots, Saturday night dark clouds loom and lightning strikes in the background, sadly it is too light to actually capture it (you need long shutter speeds to do so…). The next day I do the same thing again this time with a great sunset.

Monday we travel all easy until just 15 minutes before Eindhoven where we stand still in the train on a deserted track for 45 minutes, some dudd fire alarm almost prevents us from catching our plane, by the time we are about to take off the jet shuts down its engines and we stand on the tarmac for another 45 minutes for the bad weather to fly over, better safe than sorry.

All in all a scorcher of a weekend, a little tan, too much bad food (gained 3 pounds in 5 days wahey) and am glad to be back…..

Here are the shots from the panel talk at the Design Museum from 10 days ago…

Here are the “This Is My World Not Yours” shots.

The story started with me seeing a shot “The 39 Steps” by Arthur F. Kales, the texture, the lines and the tones. I tried to translate that into a “My World” mentality, with girls on their own, fiercely independent and strong willed. Selfish really coz that’s the world we live in…….

Styling: Tabitha Veal
Hair & Make-Up: Charlotte Fisher
Model: Monika Maron (@ M&P Models), Karen Gillan, Hayley Needs and Emily Hilton (all 3 at Bookings Models)

Monika Maron shot outside my house last Thursday. This was done in between travels and shooting at Waterloo / London Bridge.

Yesterday, mental day Started at half 8 and finished just before 9 pm. Had 4 models, 2 in the morning and 2 in the afternoon, and together with Charlotte Fisher and Tabetha V. we did a story with the rough title This Is My World Not Yours.
It was shot between Waterloo Bridge and London Bridge and a full on affair, I spent two afternoons walking around beforehand and pre visualised a few shots but I deviated a few times from what I was doing with stunning results, it’s very strong, not rocket science but just strong images with a lot of attitide, I tried to keep it simple and incorporate the architecture in the shots more like the Fashionline story: Derelict Sensation.
The only stupid thing was doing 12 shots in one day, should have been a 2 dayer.

I need to transcribe 4 interviews, I am sort of halfway with that the rest needs to be done today, not my fave task if you ask me. The Die! Die! Die! interview is barely audible, I recorded it on my phone as I could not get the voice recorder to work that evening and it sounds horrible, many rewinds…..
Besides that been prepping a fashion shoot which will be shot tomorrow for Random Mag., it will be a full on affair with 4 girls.
The story will be quite simple and I will shoot between London Bridge and Waterloo, I have been there 2x (yesetrday and two weeks ago) to check for places. I am going to push for a 16 page story, it will be tough but I need a challenge………….

So I spent the entire week on the film set of Trinity, a new drama for ITV2. Assisting the prop department (code for high speed DIY), I like it, and probably will do a feature in Leeds in a few weeks time.
Here are two shots of one of the rooms.

Thursday eve met up with Die! Die! Die! we tried meeting 2x before but both got canceled and then finally at half 9 I meet the band where they shack in Hoxton. We go outside and take some shots, the whole thing lasts 10 minutes. I do a short interview after. The stuff will be pubbed in Ponytail Magazine.

The next day on Friday I left for the Design Museum, where Ricky Burdett, Graham Stirk, Peter Bishop, Deyan Sudjic and Paul Finch held a debate. I shot them all real quick before the session, and really fuck up bad, “so you work with Boris Johnson”, RB: “No, that’s the guy who you are shooting next……” I feel like I wanna dissapear for a while….. Anyways, in the end it all went fine…..

The next day of to Leeds to shoot White Light Parade for Ponytail Magazine, I arrive early, they arrive late. Jono can’t meet us until 90 mins after so we decide to chill and have a pint. Danny Yates is hungover but the pint brings him back on to planet earth rather quickly hair of the dog…

We look around for a hilly road with terraced housing (”oh we got plenty of that”), funny thing is what we run into is not really to my liking eventually we shoot close to Danny’s house in Bradford. I see there’s lots to do there, like riding your motorbike over the grassy fields or looking for any other ways to supplement your FIXES….yagetmenow

I like shooting WLP; as a matter of fact I think they are my fave band when it comes to photographing a band, they stand and act the part perfect. They tell me they are on the brink of signing a deal with a good record label from the USA I hope they get things sorted for them they deserve it and they are ready. A mean set of pix.

So I helped my m8 Chips Chipping with moving house and boy did my body regret that After two days of humping my body just wanted to go to sleep, which I did. I just managed to send a text to cancel my appearance at the Doll & the Kicks show @ Pigalle and started to sleep at 7PM only to wake up 11 hours later……damn been a while I slept this long.

Just before that I walked in the blazing sun around Waterloo Bridge for an hour or so and took some shots for an up and coming fashion shoot, I think it will be quite simple yet strong.

Meanwhile here are two more shots of Marielle Cornelissen.

Toinight Joana and the Wolf and supposedly White Denim on Thursday.