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Interview with Scarlet James
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Ah - Scarlet - while you are whiling away your precious time in The UK and it is cold, miserable and wet, I think it would be good to talk about you and your work!
WHAT A LARF!!! Are you really really sure you want to put your career on the line????
I never asked you about when, or how, you started doing photography? (I remember you telling me that you had a darkroom in the shed where you live in Rye - suppose you did a lot of early masterpieces in that shed!) Who taught you? What kind of work did you do in those days? I always say I discovered fotography about 10 years ago ..which might be true but as time flies so fast it could have been a hundred.. As a child every family had a Brownie.. and so did ours..but I think it lived in a cupboard.. It wasn`t until we were going to Turkey for a holiday that my husband bought a point and shoot .. which we did on the beach etc... When I returned home my cats and dogs were smiling and waving so much and there was some film left in the camera that I shot them.. Brilliant - they were masterpieces ...I ran to the local camera club and handed them around - they handed them back .. Not impressed.. but I was addicted I yearned to learn more Luckily Fay Godwin lives near by and I asked her to learn me photography....after she recovered from the attack she allowed me to join her workshop. She taught me to see and look.. She also introduced me to my Guru Terry Hulf who let me stand like a soldier in his darkroom and watch a master at work.. Unfortunately he did not transplant his talent and eye over to me. But he loaned me books of the masters and I fell in love with Steiglitz, Steichen, Ralph Gibson, Sally Mann to name but a few of many. Unfortunately I have not had an`art` background but although I didn`t know it when I was young, I have been heavily influenced by the Movies... The 1940s B/W and the vibriant Technicolor Musicals with Judy Garland, lovely Rita Hayworth..Red Shoes...could dreamily go on forever ..wonder I didn`t go blind... Now that I`m on a bit of elastic UK -Florida I had to dismantle my Dad`s 50yr old shed that my friends made into a darkroom for me ......it used to be a torture chamber and/or an exciting den...depending how scared I was to enter it ..Some days it would take me hours to open the door ..I`ll build a swimming pool ..no I`ll paint the house red...No I will go in and do some prints .. then I wouldn`t come out... I`ve been away from the toxic factory for a few years..and have changed my drug of Choice??? to the magic and excitement of the computer..God I wish I was three...or at least in possession of all my facualties...!! So rich in posiblities ..such adventureous adventures .. magical moments...suicidal days of depression....and a few - sometimes lots of images that I love ..and wonder through tears of joy and frustration "How did they get there?".. "Where did that come from?" And when no one`s looking - Aren`t I **** clever.!!! Am sooo grateful to the people that put me on this path and have led and are leading THE WAY. Considering that you have'nt been doing photography for all that long you have an incredible talent - and although you say that you have no art training, that isnt evident because you have used creative techniques which are over and above the realms of straight photography. Did you find as much satisfaction when you were doing the polaroids as you obviously do now that youre using a computer? I guess it was just a diifferent way of expressing yourself. Do you still have the polaroid camera?
Do you use a computer for any of your art work? Can you see that there
would be any advantage in using a computer?
When I fell in love with Polaroid I was still a baby - painting by numbers..
Although I am still in love with Polaroid and have 3 SX-70 cameras and a 5x4 back for the beautiful 55 b/w, because of my life style and my affliction of being born lazy I prefer to work via the computer..shooting..scanning and playing..in the comfort of my own home.. instead of the shed ...
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Autumnal - mm interesting!! had never thought of that description - actually I have never thought I had a description or a style.. I`ve always been too much of a butterfly zooming in on something .. `dun that ` and orf again..
I really envy peple who have a project and can put a body of work together..Weird just reread this and Autumnal ?? I have always hated autumn found it too sad.. dying .prefer winter more up front .. Love spring - hope eternal .. summer loose too loose..
In exhibtions I have difficulty in displaying pictures that link in some way ..a theme is novel ...and `hard` to do as I go off on a tangent..
The only loose projects I ever do are Still Lives, Portraits and Nudes.
I love Still Lives - covers a multitude of sins and they stay put ..Unlike people.
Am facinated with faces and bodies.. but not together.
Both are sculptural; probably stems from going around museums and desperately wanting to touch, feel and hug those beautiful marble statues. The lines, curves and bulk are quite magnficent.
A few girlfriends modeled for me with great reluctance - and then they wouldn`t go home .. I think it gave them a sense of freedom about their bodies - what do I know but they loved doing it ..
(Actually bit weird though when I gave prints to two of the mums they hung them in their bathrooms and both of their sons removed them .. they did not want to see their mum naked - I presume.. what does that say? )
Few years ago I was lucky to have a couple of Mums to Be
One was ready to have twins and brought her mum along to a studio rented by my lovely vet which I borrowed for couple of hours .. they were a joy .. wrapped my net curtains around them and shot them quick before she broke water!!
Would loved to have been Yolanda an excentric socialite photgrapher with her Knightsbridge salon/studio or/& Dorothea Lange
It was fab meeting up with you at pixiport's Expo in Deland. What impressions of that weekend stick in your mind now?!
Have a solo ex next October (if I live that long) in Kent which will include past and present and maybe new stuff - depends how lucky I am ...
Who - What - will give you your next inspiration?
Who ? What knows??
Wish I could do a great body of heart/art....strong and defind, but it is best for me not to start out with a grand vision as I disappoint myself.
So I will see a film; TV programme; a work of art ; slip of a memory ;a floating thought; a flower will smile, or die and leave a sculpture behind. Or I`ll just sit and stare at the computer then throw it across the room or/and give it a great big hug (AND TAKE IT TO BED..non!!)
But/And that is THE MAGIC and I`m am exceedingly grateful to it.
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Pixi does focus my mind on and into a project which is not mind-bending - and safe..and is an important daily routine..
.. thanks for asking me xxxxx
Scarlet's website is on www.scarlet-james.com.
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Someone recently described your work as "Autumnal" - its an apt description, not only re the colours that you use but the subject matter in a way - the nudes, the portraits and the Vermeer inspired interiors - the obvious examples being the fruits. That lemon and pineapple are so lush that you would swear they were a reality. You told me that you literally scanned the fruits using a flatbed scanner?
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Scarlet's Pixiport Galleries Elite Gallery Weekly Gallery
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