Exposed

Voyeurism, Surveillance & the Camera. New Tate exhibition, one which I found myself completely absorbed in. Have visited it twice within three days and managed to leave maggie in search of a brew whilst I got so spell bindingly distracted by a Nan Goldin video. I genuinely think I was in that little cuboid room for a good forty minutes. 'The Ballad of Sexual Dependency', hundreds of photos of her life, intimate snapshots flicking by to what I'm sure I remember as Petula Clark's Downtown. I'm never good at trying to explain why I like work but this was mesmerising. You become a voyeur of her life almost, an onlooker to scenes of domesticity, family life, relationships, drug abuse, addiction, sex. The closeness of Goldin to those being photographed was obvious, there was never any distance in the photographs, just a complicit sense of trust. The colours were amazing too. There, that was a half decent explanation.

The charm of this exhibition is that it satiates curiosity, what individuals do and how they behave when they are unaware of any other presence, when they don't have to uphold any pretense or maintain any illusions for the sake of how they may be perceived. There's something of a charm about it, especially with reference to the photographer who roamed the streets with his Fallowfield Facile, a six pound box camera that was carried under the arm and wrapped in paper to be disguised as a package. The unseen photographer sounds like quite a good role to undertake. I love the idea of Miroslav Tichy roaming around communist Czechoslovakia with handmade cameras, taking pictures through the aid of tins, of general assortments of rubbish, which no one believed were real. I have visions of many pinhole camera projects next term.

Popped to the Amersham last night to see the Adult Youth exhibition. Some of the work was beautiful, in particular melting blocks of ice, photocopy art, abstract paintings and a tiny drawing that was hidden high up on the stairwell. Another ridiculously sized roast was made yesterday and I have enough apple sauce to last me for a year, sadly none of the actual food remains, that's where the issue may lie. I have also decided it is completely pointless to keep on tidying my room, the wave of visitors is akin to the waves of the sea, however, instead of the sand being left beautifully smooth with the receding of each wave my room looks like its been hit by a food, newspaper, magazine and general chaos bomb with the exit of each guest.