música esquisita: março 2022

autor: Ruth Bayer

título: Coil: Camera Light Oblivion

+ companion - "Sick Mirrors: Coil at the Barbican, 7 April 2002"
editora: Strange Attractor Press
nº de páginas: 172 + 32
isbn: N/A (hardback), lilimatdo a 50 cópias, a minha é a 53/500, com certificado autografado pela autora

data: 2021

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Camera Light Oblivion
Ruth Bayer
Coil: Camera Light Oblivion
By Ruth Bayer
First Published by Strange Attractor Press, 2021, in an edition of 500 copies, along with “Sick Mirrors: Coil at the Barbican, 7 April 2002
All photographs © 2021 Ruth Bayer
Design by Thiana Sare
Ruth Bayer has asserted her moral right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
Printed and Bound in Estonia by Tallinna Raamatutrükikoda
STRANGE ATTRACTOR PRESS
BM SAP, London, W1CN 3XX UK,
www.strangeattractor.co.uk

INTRODUCTION
I first met Jhonn Balance in 1988 at the photo session for the Current 93 album Earth Covers Earth, which I shot on Hampstead Heath in London. He was known to everyone as Geff (his birth name), and he wore a fabulous Hawaiian shirt to the session. That was the first time I photographed him, and the book you are now holding contains the last photos I took of him – and the only photos I took of his partner Peter ‘Sleazy’ Christopherson.
I would sometimes bump into Geff Through our great mutual friends Ossian Brown, Stephen Thrower and David Tibet – Geff knew I was a Gardnerian Witch and he was fascinated by the subject, which we discussed on numerous occasions. Later, when he occasionally visited London from Weston-super- Mare, we would meet in Crouch End, where I lived, for coffeee. It was lovely – by this time he had a bushy beard and looked like an Edwardian explorer.
Despite our many shared friends, I never met Peter until he and Geff invited me to document their Time Machines concert in London in 2000. This was to be Coil’s first music performance in England, held at the Royal Festival Hall. We had already spoken on the phone to discuss the arrangements, but when I arrived at the soundcheck Peter jumped up and greeted me with a big hug – which helped settle my nerves as I was a great admirer of his visual work, and photography had also been a great passion of his throughout his life. I photographed Geff, Peter, Ossian and Tighpaulsandra onstage during the soundcheck, in the private backstage areas, and had the great privilege of being allowed to roam the stage throughout the concert in order to hopefully get a true ‘Onstage with Coil’ experience – I was surprised and delighted to have been given full stage access but was very aware that I didn’t want to impede or distract the performers. Fortunately, for some years previously I had been photographing performance art for the Live Arts department of London’s Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA), so had plenty of experience in keeping a low profile.
I was shooting black & white and colour film with my reliable old 35mm Nikon F3HP-SLR camera, along with a couple of manual Nikon AIS lenses (a 35-105mm zoom and a 50mm f/1.8). The stage was bathed in UV black light which looked great but played havoc with my light meters – I couldn’t get anything like a useable reading. At the ICA I often had awkward shooting environments to contend with – so I decided to trust my intuition here – shooting with up to ½ second exposures, and feeling very glad I had bought along a monopod! Backstage after the concert I told Peter how concerned I was about the meter readings and how the photos may turn out, to which he replied ‘Coil are an experimental band and the images will reflect that – don’t worry about it’.
When I collected the contact sheets a day later from the processing lab I was thrilled to find all the shots had worked – even the ‘experiments’! I sent them to Peter, who immediately left a message on my answering machine telling me they couldn’t have been any better, and that he, Geff and Ossian loved them… what a relief! I later discovered that Peter would take the contact sheets from these first two performances along to future concert halls, to show technicians how the stage should look. After photographing them on the night of this first concert I went on to shoot the other two Coil London shows illustrated in this book, and each was a very special occasion I shall always treasure.
After these performances I often met with Ossian (and still do) but I would only see Peter a few more times before his death – once sadly at Geff’s funeral. My last memory of Peter was a much happier event: an art show at the Red Rose Club in Finsbury Park where he excitedly told me about his impending move to Thailand, along with an invitation to ‘visit any time’. I would like to dedicate this book to both Geff and Sleazy for their kindness, and the generosity and trust they showed in allowing me access to all areas of the performances featured here.
Ruth Bayer