fashion is posh

oh asos, how i despise that tacky free jute bag with FASHION IS POSH plastered on one side you gave me 2years ago that's stayed in my cupboard. oh auntie patricia, how i haven't used those fabric pens you gave me 5years ago that have stayed in my draw.

hang on a cotton pickin' minute! this gives me an idea: merchandise. who wants a twee & toast bag?

alura!

i finally visited nonna today, but failed to notice the zoom on my camera lens was at a 45 degree angle & therefore wasn't at all happy about focusing. lord knows what happened there, probably alcohol. i was worried nonna might not want me to take photos of her but actually she was quite the opposite. as soon as she saw my camera:

"toh emanuella! teka my picture! yes i sit here? alura!"
"what does alura mean, nonna?"
"there you are!"

so although i took no actual photographs - apart from this extremely blurry portrait, my visit really helped clear some things up. we put the world to rights, she made me some tea, some food & tried to get me drunk on lambrini. conclusion: nonna & i are very alike.

finally

at long last rosie came to rochester for a night of 3drinks/3quid madness. pre-drinking turned into pre-posing as rosie forgot her compact camera, and i sure as hell wasn't about to take my 450d with me. an eventful evening was had. many malibus, archers and bull frog concoptions were had and, for some, even pints of wine (not me, i gave up on the idea of wine quite some time ago). i feel awful today, but had a good time putting myself in this state so shan't complain. it was good to see rosie again.

jumpin' at the go go

le beat bespoke isn't far away now. i'm so excited i might throw up. here's some images from the last crossfire event. i'm not going to pretend they're the best images ever. this time, they will be brilliant.

victoriana

the day jonathan packed us all up in the minibus and took us dungeoness. the strangest place i've ever seen, but i like it. when i'm driving, this wild west town on the british seaside is where i'm heading first. this was the only shot i liked out of everything on the two reels. i sat in the middle of the vast expanse of nothing dressed in a beige trench coat and riding boots and tried to forget the modern world. when i composed this, i wanted to exclude anything in the landscape that suggested human intervention. thus, i did proceed to believe myself of a jane austen character and hoped that some darcy-like figure on his noble steed might inquire as to my reasons for sitting alone. something like that anyway.

finished it off with a sepia looking lith print. lush.

here goes nothing

the past two days i've turned into a hermit. all silly and emotional, agrophobic and insane. i decided to vent the upset into a series of images. i'm surrounded by memories that i can't confront, so i let my camera do it for me.

'il postino'

"italian cinema" my tutors said. i started looking at the work of antonioni. but my search over youtube lead me to this little beaut "il postino". its a really sweet film, set around the time my nonno & nonna left italy. i've watched about half of it but can already tell its going to be one of my favourite films. having said that, i bet the end will now be really shit. i'll keep you posted. either way, its a visual reference.

nonna

phillip toledano 'days with my father'

new project: "do whatever the fuck you like". bonus time. and boy do i have a grand plan for this project.

a few weeks ago i met with my uncle's wife (on my dad's side) to talk wedding photography with a friend of hers who's tying the knot in summer. her future husband hates photographs, and i loath over posing so they've basically said photograph the whole day as a sort of undercover spy and we'll pay you. just my cup of tea. but this has nothing to do with why i'm writing this blog really. just a bit of FYI.

after lunch, i headed back over over to sevenoaks with my auntie to pick up my four year old cousin bella. my nan on that side had been looking after her. my nan/nonna who, until then, had no idea i go by the name emmie. it was probably the 8th time i've ever seen her in my life. we spoke as if strangers, she called me "ennie" a number of times & constantly informed me how wonderful my cousin bella was. i wanted to point out all the amazing things me & my sister had done in our lives so far, but it would have fallen on deaf ears.

i've always been told "you're half italian, be proud". my skin is pale, i have blue eyes and my hair is a mousy blonde. i don't have a roman nose, nor do i speak fluent italian (or even partial for that matter). all i know of my italian heritage is my name. my middle name is nonna's first name, margherita, yet i know nothing about her. an empty namesake & a saddening thought. with this in mind, i looked around her flat & strangely, it started to resemble mine. it was a mine of objects & floral patterns. her eyes too are blue, & as far as i am aware, nonna is fully italian.

but there's a lot of fallings out & secrecy that's gone on in that side of the family, all of which i'm completely perplexed & confused by. we never see nonna. i don't know why so i don't know if i am like her at all. i must be. i came from her. all i know is "she's crazy, devout roman catholic & never remembers your birthdays". i can't understand it. my mum's side is so completely open, everyone lives on eachother's doorstep. i've probably seen my english nan 8 times this month, let alone trying to recall all the times i've seen her my entire life.

with this in mind (yes, ALL of this), i've sparked the idea for a project. i'm going to find out for myself. i'm big enough & ugly enough to go visit nonna by my own means & i'm going to attempt to rebuild some sort of relationship through photographing her. i don't know what will happen. i may end up agreeing with my dad. or i may end up realising who i am & feel more comfortable in my skin. how can you know yourself if you have no idea where you come from? toledano's work, days with my father, is going to be a real influence (see image above).

i hope i haven't bored you. & i hope you come back to check how it goes on. if you don't hear from me in a while, nonna has called the mafia on me.

cup of tea and a walk

i miss bridizzle. i found these pictures the other day when i was gathering up some work to show the fashion department. it was in a vein attempt to persuade them to let me photograph the graduate show. i'm not sure how it went, i come over all nervous and awkward (which might have had something to do with the video camera filming the entire "this is not an interview" interview). regardless of whether they choose me or not, it lead me to rediscover these little gems. i thought they looked a bit dated, you could almost be in the year 1979 in the north of england somewhere. instead we were in a shitty field next to halls in rochester in the year 2009. this was before i had got the hang of colour correction. this was also the day a dog snogged me.

"work" experience

horst a. friedrichs 'im one'

i don't think i could have found a more ideal work placement. my series "dandy" (see earlier post) was initially influenced by the work of horst a. friedrich, who's work "i'm one" (above) i'd seen launched at the new untouchables brighton mod weekender '09.

on the off chance i e-mailed rob bailey, the new untouchables top dog, just to see if i could do some event reportage for their blog as my placement. he said i could cover this year's le beat bespoke and as luck would have it, horst himself would be photographing and was happy to me to work with him.

i'm still baffled. it just goes to show: its not what you know, its who you know. the perks of being mod.

a guide to being twee

GUYS! GUYS! i've just had a great idea!

since dinu li took interest in my little books, i've began to understand why everyone says i should publish my silly little books, but who really is going to buy a book of illustrations about the stupid things i get up to? most of it doesn't even make sense. but for those interested and who know me, i thought i'd start a seperate blog called "being twee: a step by step guide". i've just started a fresh new paperchase book so i'll be updating it almost simultaneously with the actual books of twee. don't hold your breath though. it's quite evident from this blog that my organisation skills are something to be desired.

but anyway, here's the link. it's pretty empty right now. Very, actually. It's pretty much a title and a space, but bare with me! i'll scan my little legs off this weekend and maybe give a brief history of the books. this new book is already off to a good start. it has a floral cover and highlights include: o.a.p. fancy dress, mr t impressions, the midnight beasts and a perverted wanking stripper. enjoy.

dandy

"Look, I don't wanna be the same as everybody else. That's why I'm a Mod, see? I mean, you gotta be somebody, ain't ya, or you might as well jump in the sea and drown."

My fascination with mods is unhealthy. The smartness and expense spent on appearance vs the grey working class backdrop has a romanticism to it. But as with any subculture, it intrigues and baffles me all at the same time. It's a strife for individuality yet you end up being the same as everyone else who wants to be different. A gang of people who don't want to be part of the gang! Irony. I love you.

Still, this doesn't phase my obsession. It's a coping mechanism. A way to escape the surroundings you're apart of which is still an issue and probably why the scene still exists today. I could go on forever about how much I love the mod scene; the scooters, the suits, the constant revivals. But instead I made a series of photographs, suprisingly enough, named "Dandy".

http://newuntouchables.ning.com/

"naked?!" "yes, naked."

i love getting my own way. especially when it involves persuading my twig of a boyfriend to stand outside his house in a field at two in the morning, stark bollock naked at a temperature of around 0 degrees. hypothermia schmypothermia.

this shot is for the dan holdsworth lead project "man made & natural". i was looking at moon light and man's relationship to the landscape and how the moon can change our perception of a place. by day a forest is all airy fairy and magical. by night its the dwellings of derranged killers... well, in our heads anyway. so here i'm trying to communicate the alienation of man to the landscape, taking influence from sci-fi an' all that lark.