FILM
The Truth Is In The Negative
Photographs by Pádraig Grant
The Rowe Street Gallery
October 17th – November 4th 2014
The Rowe Street Gallery will present 'FILM - The Truth Is In The Negative', the latest in a long line of exhibitions featuring enduring, classic black and white images by internationally exhibited photographer Pádraig Grant.
The work was launched by Alma Hynes, President of Soroptimist International (Wexford) on Friday 17th October 2014 at 6pm.
The treatment of light and shade, the love of home, the addiction to adventure and capturing 'the' moment are just some of the elements that are alive in Pádraig's photographs. His approach to image making is always about passionate engagement.
Pádraig has traveled the world in search of existentially defining moments, images made against a backdrop of terrible and terrifying calamity, these images are snatched from a fleeting and ever receding reality.
The images that he makes of Wexford are informed by this world view. But in Wexford he is looking for the “global in the local” as Billy Roche puts it.
The BBC said when reviewing one of Pádraig's exhibitions that he “has a powerful point to make that hits you when you least expect it”.
A short film, shot by Roberto Forte and also called 'FILM' accompanies this exhibition.
(Pádraig will be raffling one of his pictures at the exhibition to raise funds for his Liberia Ebola Appeal that Wexford people have been donating to over the last couple of weeks.)
The title refers to the Pádraig's love of shooting pictures on black and white film. For as he says himself “the truth is in the negative”.
(If you're wondering why this is written in the 3rd person singular it is because it's to accommodate lazy journalism!)
BACKGROUND:
The IDEA was the number 7.
I believe that there are only seven stories told in cinema. Perhaps this is a myth; a film aficionado might know but for me the idea of their being only seven stories is enough to start with. Also, there are the seven seas, the seven pillars of wisdom, the Magnificent Seven, the secret seven, the seven dwarfs, the seven deadly sins, the seven wonders of the world, the seven peaks and seven days a week etc etc.
The MECHANISM was 7 questions:
I asked people to think of a question or questions about photography generally or about my photography specifically.
This is how I expressed it to them:
START
I ASKED THE FOLLOWING TO ASK ME A DIFFICULT QUESTION ABOUT PHOTOGRAPHY:
Anne McCabe, TV director and producer
Denis Collins, gallery owner and poet
Eoin Colfer, author
Tom Mooney, newspaper editor and poet
Marie Brennan, AD of Cathedral Arts Centre
This is how I approached them:
"I'm making a short film about photography (and my role in it) tentatively entitled "Film". This will be shown in conjunction with an exhibition.
As a narrative device I'm structuring the plot around the number 7. There are, allegedly, only seven types of movie, seven dwarfs, seven pillars of wisdom and seven days a week. I will base my "Film" on seven of my photographs. (And also seven times two minutes makes for a nice viewing time.) For this to succeed I need seven questions about photography that you were afraid to ask? Can you ask me one or two or seven? I am asking a few people - don't fear, the company will be fine.
You can go all Susan Sontag or Roland Barthes if you want. But I'd prefer ...You......! How it works is that you give me a question and I think about it; then, I match one of my pictures to it and my response is filmed. I have commitments to show "Film" at the Cathedral Arts Centre in Waterford, The Gaslamp Gallery in Gorey and my own place - all in October 2013. It will be shown on the web also.
As you are undoubtedly one of the longest and best supporters of my humble art I'd greatly appreciate your help.
Thank you!"
END