I finally sat down to watch a programme I had recorded on BBC4 a few weeks earlier – What Do Artists Do All Day? The artist in question was the photographer, Tom Wood.
Needless to say Tom was new to me; that being said I did enjoying watching this programme and his return trip home to County Mayo in Ireland. Tom had been coming ‘home’ to Ireland every year, if only for a summer holiday, since his parents left with him at the age of 3 to come over to England as a result of a mixed religion marriage.
Tom claims to have taken photographs almost every day the last 40 years, with much of his work being taken in Liverpool and on Merseyside where he has lived for much of those 40 years. His approach to photography was to try and blend in to the communities within which he was taking his images and be accepted by them, allowing his to carry on his craft in an unobtrusive manner. Tom often returns to the same places time and time again to establish those important relationships with his subjects – he became to be known as “Photie Man” to the children. He has photographed on the streets of Liverpool and the surrounding area in pubs, clubs, markets, workplaces, including shipyards, and of course when in Liverpool, outside football grounds!
Tom Wood – Three Wise Women
His approach to photography is certainly different from mine as a pretty much walks around all day ,every day, with a small Compact System Camera attached to his right-hand – often clicking away without raising his eye to the viewfinder, knowing his equipment so well as to be able to frame and composes images shooting ‘from the hip’.
During this programme, Tom visited an old drapery store called Hickson’s in Crossmolina, County Mayo. As is his way Tom has been to this old family run clothing store numerous times – having known the old original owner for many years. He asked to see the upstairs storage areas and despite the reservations from the current staff, Tom was allowed upstairs with his camera; he was beside himself with joy! The upstairs was messy, cluttered, damp and getting towards derelict; piles of old shoes, toys and clothes were everywhere and Tom said to the TV camera “this is just exciting as a landscape outside to me – I would gladly spend a week in here”.
Tom Wood in Hickson’s, County Mayo (from the BBC programme, What Do Artists Do All Day?)
When Tom isn’t walking around with his small compact system camera in his hand, he will have his Noblex professional panographic film camera and tripod to take landscape images.
Despite his 40 years in the business, his bestselling picture came from his second roll of film back in the 1970’s (Ntlemen)
Tom Wood – Ntlemen
During Tom’s musing to camera, he came up with an interesting quote: “Photography is the easiest of art forms, but maybe that makes it the hardest”.
Discuss.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03wxk2w
http://www.nationalmediamuseum.org.uk/planavisit/exhibitions/tomwood/introduction.aspx
OCA 