For Wyman has had a unique, some might say enviable life, but he remains wide-eyed at the fame that he’s attained; the riches that he’s amassed; the legends he’s counted as friends.

His grandmother brought him up during the war and taught the young Wyman to collect things and keep a diary.

“I kept all that stuff when I was a little kid, going through the war, gas masks, unfortunately my mum threw it all away when I was in Germany, thought it was all kid’s stuff, just dumped it, which is a shame,” he explains.

But he kept squirrelling away tickets and sketches; notes and photos. A reminder perhaps that for ‘the boring one’ from the Stones his surreal life was actually real. It happened.

“Because I was always at the back in the shadows, on-stage. People used to think I had something of the night, that I was a bit violent, back there, not doing anything. They got completely the wrong idea,” he says.

You haven’t got a dark side then?

“No, no, not at all,” he laughs heartily.

Keith & Bowie © Joey Paige

“For me it’s amazing to think that a bass player….. I’ve played championship cricket, scored a hat trick at the Oval, I bowled out Michael Holding…I mean all these amazing things.  I moved to France and met all these artists, and then I got involved with that…Chagall, all these great artists who became friends… I met all the tennis players, I met all the English footballers…Kevin Keegan, Borg, Connors… I knew them all really well. John McEnroe, I met him before the show at Wembley, we played table tennis and he just beat me, 23, 24…”

Wyman says all this, more to himself really, in a can you believe it? tone. But of course I can believe it because he’s a rock legend himself.

He snorts rock legend? and shakes his head.

Do you not see yourself like that?

“Nah, me and Charlie ( Watts, the drummer ) don’t. We don’t crave the adulation. I think the others do, and that’s great.”

Is that why they’re still doing it?

“Maybe. Me and Charlie never did. Charlie said two weeks ago, I don’t want to do Glastonbury ( the Stones headline the festival this year ) I don’t want to go on tour any more, I want to leave. But they won’t let him.” He chuckles.

Keith Temple, Rex Features

But Wyman, who left the Stones in 1993,  has met the most talented artists and sportspeople; travelled the world and has three houses ( one with a moat no less ) because he was a member of arguably the most famous and successful rock group on the planet.  It’s hard to separate the man from the band  because they, it, this glamorous, trailblazing entity, defined him, made him.

And yet he seems to have a very conflicted view of them, at once celebrating his involvement as one of the band’s founder members – he includes numerous photographs and images of them in this book and there are only 1,962 copies, a nod to the band forming in 1962 –   but, in equal measure, despising the fact that they demanded his all, and, indeed, that’s what most people want to know about.  There are no half measures.

Do you regret leaving Stones?

“No.”  Sigh.

Was it deliberate that the publication of this book coincides with the 50th anniversary of the band?

“No, it just happened to be. But it’s quite nice.”

“Was Charlie always your best friend in the band?”

“Yeah, but I still see them all socially, we send each other birthday presents, Christmas presents.

I suppose you can’t have gone through all that time and experience with the Stones and not still have some connection?

“There’s a nostalgia there. But for me it was time to move on. I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life in there, I had so many more things that I was interested in doing. You see, when you start with a band in 1962 and this is true of The Beatles, The Kinks, The Who, everybody thought, two years, three years if you’re lucky. All of us thought like that. Then suddenly 30 years later I’m still waiting to do all the things that really interested me in life.”

What did you want to do?

“Experiences of different culture, going to the Pyramids, going to South America, Easter Island and all that kind of thing. I always wanted to do that.

But you travelled a lot when you were touring?

“Yeah, but there was too much of it actually. It puts you off.” He smiles ruefully, and seems lost in thought.

“I thought that was the pinnacle. I didn’t want to be in a band that was on the decline. That hasn’t happened, but they could well have been. I wanted to be in a band that was right up there, and I’ve never regretted it for one moment. I mean financially I’ve lost a fortune. They told me when I left, if you leave now you’ll lose 20 million. But you make up your mind, and there’s more important things in life sometimes. I had my nice little nest egg and I thought that’ll do me. I’ve got what I wanted. I’ve got three beautiful houses, wonderful family, got some nice cars. What more do you need?”

It becomes clear that Wyman sees himself as an ordinary bloke who, more by chance than design, found himself as a global superstar. But there were huge sacrifices, that he remains painfully aware of.

Bill with Family at Heathrow Airport ©Everett Collection / Rex Features

“ The last 20 years have been the happiest times of my life,” he says. “I’ve seen my children grow up. You see, in the 60’s, I was always on the road travelling, for three, four, five months. My son had learned to walk, I missed that; he learned to eat, I missed that, all those things, and then suddenly you turn around and he’s 11 years old and he’s going to junior school. So when I came home I’d grab him and we’d go in the car and zoom off to Richmond Park. I missed so many birthdays, I couldn’t be there….” he trails off. He seems genuinely sad.

“Now, I’ve got three teenage daughters and I’ve seen them grow up. One of them designed the cover of the book. Katie, my eldest, she’s an artist.”

But here’s the thing. Wyman isn’t just an ordinary bloke, despite the fact that he’s not starry or effervescent.  He made his first bass guitar himself in 1961; has published seven other books, is an accomplished photographer ( “photography began when we were on tour, in a hotel room, in a port, plane, there’s nothing to do so I’d take a camera everywhere” ) owns the successful Sticky Fingers restaurant in Kensington and is a keen amateur archeologist, even designing his own metal detector.

I venture that he’s like a sponge, soaking up every piece of talent and knowledge that crosses his path.

“ Yeah, you could say that. I  haven’t put a foot wrong, I must be fortunate, I must be a lucky person, I don’t know.”  There’s that  I can’t believe it tone again.

But I want to know what nugget of wisdom, or truth, can this seemingly everyday guy, who’s charted modern history through the lens of celebrity, impart? What has he learned?

“ Travel for a start, the wonder of that…..” He trails off again.

With Gina lollobrigida and wife Suzanne © Alan Davidson

But the answer to my question is right in front of me.

Bill Wyman’s Scrapbook is a massive beast, reflecting a huge life, but it’s made up of the personal: candid, handwritten comments, lyrics, photos of his wife, Suzanne.

Wyman’s aspirations, before the Stones juggernaut hit, were to : “Find a nice lady, get a nice house, nice garden at the front and the back, get a dog. I always wanted a fort, you know,  I ended up buying a manor in Suffolk with a fort, with a moat and a drawbridge. I look at it and think , that’s what I wanted when I was six, I never thought I’d get it.”

The big dreams of a small boy. He’s come full circle. And for all the fame and glory, it’s the little things that turn out to be the big things.

No wonder he’s now the happiest he’s ever been.

Bill Wyman’s Scrapbook is available for purchase now from www.concertlive.co.uk RRP £229. Each book is signed by Bill, numbered and certified. Strictly a limited edition out of 1962 copies.

Kevans, who has had solo exhibitions in New York, London and Vienna and whose work appears in collections including the Pallant House Gallery, 21c Museum, the Saatchi Collection and the collections of Lord Rothermere, Stephen Fry, Marc Quinn, Adam Sender, and John McEnroe, reveals a sphere that’s increasingly within reach, and a seemingly viable career option for today’s children.

“ Surveys repeatedly show that children want to ‘be famous’ more than anything else.  This isn’t surprising when you look at how TV shows, magazines, music and toys are marketed to children.  If I were a child now, I’d want to be famous.” says Kevans.

Her series Lost Boys featured former child stars who ended up suffering  devastation and humiliation and Girls explored the sexualisation of young girls, with the displayed paintings unframed, so they looked liked posters, in the setting of a little girl’s bedroom.

So what inspires her to explore this very difficult area?

“I wrote my thesis at art school  on images of children in art and, naturally, I wrote about the sexualisation of children. I was interested in how, on the one hand, images of children are seen as twee, whilst on the other hand, they are seen as dangerously sexual,” she explains.

Annie who trained at Central St. Martin’s and was a finalist in both the Women of the Future awards and the Jerwood Drawing Prize has translated this research into her unique and distinctive portraits, achieved by painting on certain oil painting paper rather than canvas.

“I attempted my first painting of Hitler as a boy in 1999 and worked on a series of ‘evil’ children sitting on stools a couple of years later (these included Fred West, Bloody Mary and Hitler),” she says. “I returned to the idea in 2003, a year before graduation, determined to create a large series of works showing dictators as little boys.  I found that colourful canvases didn’t work together and discovered some oil-painting paper which I absolutely loved.  I love the surface of this particular paper and the fact that the emphasis is put on the concept behind the work.”

The soft translucence of the portraits enable the viewer to almost see through the paint straight to the core which as at all of Kevans’ work : the heartbreaking duality of vulnerability and power; innocence and experience; truth and reality.

This crux was poignantly illustrated by one of her subjects, Doreen Tracey who was a Mouseketeer in Disney’s famous Mickey Mouse Club, who Kevans  painted along with Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera for her series Mouseketeers.  As an adult, Doreen had posed for Playboy, semi-clad in her ears and Mouseketeer jumper. She contacted Kevans by email,  thrilled with the  painting of her as a serious little girl.  She signed the email “Always your biggest fan. Mouseketeer Doreen Tracey”

Of course, portraying children can be tricky, and many artists  have fallen foul of the popular media and been accused of ‘using’ children, or presenting their young subjects pornographically ( photographer Vee Speers was accused of just that last year with her exhibition at the Little Black Gallery. )

“People today are almost programmed to associate pictures of nude or semi-nude children with sex and paedophilia,” says Kevans. “ Yet they don’t seem to mind the ever-present sexualized children in advertising, which seems to get away with this exploitation by making sure the children are not naked.

” I think art can and does represent children in a way that popular media can’t.  The important thing to look at is the motive behind the work.  For many people, the link between photography and pornography is such that it is particularly difficult to accept that photographs of naked or semi-naked children could be anything but pornographic. As far as I can see Vee Speers’ work is not pornographic as the children in her photos are not sexualized.  Some of them have some flesh showing but we need to stop associating bare flesh with sex.  When we see semi-naked children on the beach we don’t think of sex.”

In an increasingly image-led world  what is Kevans’ take on social media and how we present ourselves in the digital realm?

“In the past, a person’s entire life would be illustrated by one surviving image of them, if there was one at all, “ she says. “ This element of mystery is gradually disappearing as we share increasing numbers of photographs with each other and leave them floating in cyberspace for future generations to look at.  I think Facebook is an incredibly detailed interactive diary of our lives and I think there is something quite healthy about it.”

Perhaps the truth, despite our photo-shopping, curating and hiding, will always out.

See Annie Kevans’ egg Crush which refers to youthful infatuations with child stars as well as to the pressure put upon children working within the media, as part of Lindt’s Big Egg Hunt, at Covent Garden, London, until 7th April. More information here

Her series, ‘Boys’, featuring 30 ‘evil’ political leaders as little boys will be shown at the Saatchi Gallery ‘The Power of Paper’ exhibition in June.

In fact, where once mass culture and individual identity within it formed the backbone of much of Stuart’s work, since becoming a father he’s moved from London to Dorset and  finding safety, childhood and the meaning of maturity are themes that have now surfaced.

“The world’s changed a lot,  there’s been the recession, and I’ve changed,” he explains. “ Moving was a shock to start with, I thought, where are the people? But I’ve settled into it now, put up a studio. The pace of life is different, you notice nature. And I’m intrigued watching my son lose childhood and start becoming an adult. Some kids pick up a stick and draw with it, others think it’s a gun. I’m intrigued by that moment, why does it happen, where does it come from?”

Stuart – who’s been dubbed the  Basquiat of the Noughties -  is “still recovering” from his blockbuster exhibition It’s Hard to Be A Saint in This City in Hong Kong and China last year. He’s directed a video for band Dubstar, currently in post-production;  created an installation for mental health charity MIND for the inaugral Art 13 art fair and is currently working ( there’s that crossover again ) with presenter Reggie Yates and models Suki Waterhouse and Imogen Morris Clarke, curating their first exhibition I’ll Be Your Mirror which will show at EB&Flow Gallery in April.

“Their work is very worthwhile, it’s not just a model whipping out a camera-phone,” he explains. “Suki and Imogen both shoot on film and they’ve always had the skill and always used it, photograph themselves when they get home, reclaiming themselves, sometimes straight after a shoot.”

Inspiring others is important for Stuart, and he, along with photographers Rankin and Giles Duley are the three judges for the Arts University Bournmouth’s second  Who Are You 2 competition, inviting creative 14-19 year olds to make a piece of work that reflects who they are in the world today. The prize for the 20 winners will be to have their work supersized and displayed on billboards across the country.

“Creativity is vital, it’s the lifeblood of this country,” says Stuart, “ We don’t manufacture any more, so art, publishing, advertising, film-making, fashion, need to be encouraged, it’s our future.”

Recent research commissioned by Arts University Bournemouth shows that almost two thirds of people in the UK gave up on their dream career by the time they were 20 years old, while one in four people said that they didn’t feel confident enough to pursue their dream vocation.

What does he think about the Government attitude, who have cut funding to arts education and the lack of encouragement for artistic endeavour in schools?

“ It’s a massive part of our economy,  and their attitude is very short sighted, I don’t understand it,”  he says.

Perhaps the powers that be should take heed of this modern-day Basquiat who, after all, is proof that  intellect and artistry can have popular appeal, and that with encouragement creative freedom can translate into lifelong success.

Art 13, 1-3rd March, Olympia Grand Hall.
For more information on Arts University Bournemouth’s Who Are You 2 competition visit www.facebook.com/inspiredAUB or the website www.aub.ac.uk/whoareyou2 Deadline for entries is 11th March 2013.

All images © Stuart Semple

Yes, my own work has gone from strength to strength. It’s given me a new confidence working for Coldplay and I’ve traveled to some incredible places with them, all this has given me a lot of inspiration that I hope to channel into my studio work this year.It would be my dream to find a high end gallery to represent my work around the world…

Apart from being a great experience has it progressed your skills or style?

Yeah, from working fast on a huge scale (but to a brief), I feel it’s really freed me up and my new painting style is now a lot more intuitive .

Coldplay are known for having specific concepts and outfits for each of their albums. Will this mean they will seek out a different style/medium or artist for their next output, or are their plans for more collaborations?

www.paris1974.com

Set on the banks of the Thames The Bingham is the perfect boutique hotel, with the added bonus of being minutes from the busy centre of Richmond and Central London. Once two Georgian houses now converted into one Lady Ann Bingham rented it in 1821. Later inhabitants included poets Katherine Bradley and Edith Cooper (who wrote under the pseudonym Michael Field )  who entertained many literary figures including W.B.Yeats. The Bingham’s 15 bedrooms are named after their poetry and works

This Valentine’s Day the Bingham is the quintessential romantic venue, and the restaurant will be serving St. Valentine’s Afternoon Tea with fanciful sandwiches, scones, cakes and pastries. Book a special lunch date, or a romantic dinner with the Valentine’s Day six-course tasting menu at £95 per person.

Which role defined you?

Kelly from This is England has a big part of me, I have played her since I was 15 – a lot of work went into her.

Dreamer or realist?
Realist …. although I do daydream…

What inspires you?
People who try hard and know what they want to achieve.

What irritates you?
I’m pretty chilled although if people make me late or are not time aware … I do find that annoying.

Lazy morning or long run in the park?
Lazy morning …DVD…Sorted!

Westfield or shop online?
Westfield. I have to try things on and easily return them.

© Phil Fisk

If you could take a flight anywhere today, where would you go?
Australia, I would go and surf and check out the Outback.

Downton or Homeland?
Downton, I haven’t caught Homeland yet.

Favourite TV dinner?
A good Thai soup

Best film ever?
Snatch. I loved it when I was at school and the music. I just wanted to be in it.

Tell us a secret.
Jason Watkins and Stephanie Beacham had a garden competition outside their rooms on set .There were picket fences, gnomes, fake grass and bird houses on the go -  it was pretty funny!

The Trollied Christmas special airs on Christmas Eve at 9pm on Sky1HD. To keep up with Chanel’s news, follow her on Twitter @ChanelCresswell

How did your style of fusing the figurative and abstract come about?
The thing is when I started painting about 10 years ago I came from a really strong,  Dutch influenced classical painting background, with a particular focus on chiaroscuro. Perfecting my technique and the whole style of making everything perfect was my main objective at that point. That was my goal when I started off and then, slowly over the past decade,  I fragmented and deconstructed that original idea of painting as semi-realist but still in a classical form, trying to paint and take that concept apart more and more and more. That’s when it started to become all layered with different ideas and things.

STRATA focuses very much on the Cape Malay woman – what is it that you want to say about her? STRATA is basically about layers, so it has a dual purpose in the actual title which means ‘layers’, which connects to the way the works have been produced and  the layering of wall paint. Over a long period of time I would layer the paint then it would dry and I would rework to achieve the effect. 
At the same time that whole process connects to the subjects, not only the subject of Cape Malay but also the human condition. But Cape Malay  is a fusion of different cultures layered together,  as Cape Town and the West Cape region with  Dutch, Malaysian and Black influences. That whole fusion is so unique and something that happened  as they bought in the Malaysians to South Africa to work, and the black native people working there and the White Europeans who all mixed together. 
This mix meant that the Cape Malay race was born. As a result of this, a crisis of identity happened. People didn’t know where they were from. Which meant they didn’t necessarily belong or fit into to the black community or the white community, making them in-between and thus creating a sub-culture which can be related back to my technique and idea of layering. The sub-culture created a whole new way of living, speaking and taking on religion. They created their own dialects. At the time Christianity was the government’s chosen religion for the people. Then a large community converted to Islam, which created a rather unique Muslim way of living.

Is there a particular South African style or school – and if so can you describe it? I don’t think there is a particular style or school in SA. But there is a prominent  group – the ‘Resistance Artists’. These are artists against apartheid with people like Willam Kentridge who is one of the best known South African artist. I think that’s the main thing. There are also  influences from African painting, which also influenced European artists such as Picasso. But it’s a very universal art scene in Africa compared to anything you will find in Europe.

Can you tell me a little about your process – how do you go from idea to finished canvas and how long does it take?
I will have various sized canvasses at different stages in my studio that I am working on at one time. For example 10 or more canvasses standing at a certain stage because oil paint takes so long to dry,  so I paint a little bit and wait till it dries then return to it a week or so later. So, it can be very frustrating. The process of building up these layers and working with the pieces in the studio is very much a part of the work, in its creation. A lot of that involves abstract specialism -  in the movement. Jackson Pollock worked on the floor and danced around with paint brushes, making all these splatters, and he considered that as much as part of the artwork as what you see.  But in the studio there is this whole magical thing that happens. So I freak out and throw paint at the canvass, and this whole thing happens inside the studio which becomes a part of the artwork, but  what you see is the finished view of that whole creation process.

Is it mainly South Africa that inspires you? How do other cites or countries compare?
I think I am interested in people in general and just happened to do the Cape Malay woman. I am interested and inspired by what happens around me. That’s why I tend to do ethnic groups and people, but I am very much inspired by European art  as well as African art, but there is definitely an African influence within my work, especially with my sculpture. Perhaps, it ‘s because when I did these bronzes with fine little lines going through them they were inspired very much by the Benin heads from the Benin region in west Africa. They stuck with me, the whole traditional trial kind of thing, making cuts and marks in their faces. That’s one particular thing that stuck with me.

Who would you like to paint your portrait?
Francis Bacon.

Is the act of painting an emotional process for you?
It is, but  sometimes I don’t think so !  I just keep doing it. I think artists that keep working are emotional people who have this need to create things which stimulate them,  and make them feel better. I don’t think I am crazy but I think in a certain way there is this emotional thing – but  I release it often enough to make me feel normal. So essentially, yes. I think there is an emotional value to everything I do and I think that release through my work probably makes me sane.

Other than your country, what else inspires you?
I love European paining. It inspired me to actually go and see pieces that I really really love in Europe. In the Tate there is a specific piece by Walter Sickert. I remember seeing this painting in a book when I was 16 ‘The Dutch Girl’.’ I fell in love with that painting when I saw it, I don’t know what,  but something happened to me when I saw it. It’s funny because at that time I was very focussed on the classical. That painting is actually something that relates to what I am doing now.

How do you feel when you come to London?
I love it. It feels like, this is the real world. When you are from another South Africa, everything is happening and it gets busy. But you come here and you are like ‘aaahhh’ this is the place to be, this is real, in the sense of the Universal. But I still love South Africa. Who cares if people know who I am in South Africa?  This is where it’s at.

What next for you?
The world…. Haha. A few things in the pipeline. Building a stronger relationship with my English audience. Do some more shows in the UK then take my work to New York and Hong Kong eventually.

STRATA, Rook and Raven Gallery,  7 Rathbone Place, London W1T 1HN, until 24th November

He was notoriously and vehemently opposed to colour, and now in the inaugral exhibition from the Positive View Foundation: Henri Cartier-Bresson, A Question of Colour,  at Somerset House, the debate of black and white versus colour reopens.

We asked five photographers: Terry O’Neill, John Stoddart, Julia Fullerton-Batten, Jim Marks and Adrian Weinbrecht, all with their own unique style, for their views on Cartier-Bresson, and what his influence has been on them.

WHAT DOES CAPTURING THE DECISIVE MOMENT MEAN TO YOU?

TERRY: It’s having the eye for a magical moment – and the patience and the reflexes to catch it.

JOHN: The first thing I have to say is,Cartier – Bresson is one of the greats of photography, the second thing I have to say: I find him boring, I always have. The ‘one shot,’ the one and only lens, I think he was a snob, and I think he held back so many young photographers with his “pure” views on photography. Look at the work of William Klein – freedom!!
The decisive moment is something I work at getting to over a session, it can happen in the first few minutes or right at the end of a shoot.

JIM: It’s the moment in time that you as a photographer choose to capture. It harks back to a beautiful era when film was precious and you had a limited amount of frames and so had to be so selective about when you took a picture.

JULIA: Every time that I imagine an image, a long time before I go anywhere near a camera, I know that there will be a moment on the shoot when the expressions and body language of the people I’m photographing will perfectly sum up what I’m trying to say… the emotion and essence of what I was imagining. All I hope is that I can recognise that moment and capture it.

ADRIAN: As someone that shoots  dance and human movement, the decisive moment for me is that point of a movement just as a dancer/runner etc. reaches the maximum extension. In dance it’s often the moment where the feet are pointing beautifully.  There’s also been a trend in commercial photography in the last few years to shoot intentionally before or after the decisive moment, thereby allowing the viewer to construct the decisive moment and their own narrative, eg a runner doing up their shoelaces before a race, footballers hugging after a goal.

Henri Cartier-Bresson Brooklyn, New York, 1947, © Henri Cartier-Bresson/Magnum Photos, Courtesy Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson

BLACK AND WHITE OR COLOUR?

TERRY: Black and white every time – it’s timeless

JOHN: Both work for me, B&W on film is far better than digital.

JIM: Colour dates while black and white seems to be somehow timeless. Each decade has its own colour palette. The beauty of black and white is that you focus on the form of things. In an weird way black and white is having its own rebirth with specialised black and white digital cameras like the Red Epic Monochrome.

JULIA: Colour every time.  It’s not that I have anything against B&W it’s just that I love the complexity of colour and that the way I’m able to control the colours in my images by styling and post production.  The ways that colours sit together is a constant fascination to me. Every now and then I have a moment of gratitude to all the great photographers who enabled colour photography to be taken seriously.

ADRIAN: Colour is a wonderful thing, however it can also be very distracting. Our response to colour is steeped in our survival evolution, as a consequence we can often have strong sub-conscious responses. The beauty of Black and White is that this distraction is removed and this helps us to concentrate fully on the subject. If it’s a strong B&W portrait then we tend to look at the face deeper/differently, if it’s a landscape then the shapes and patterns within the composition play a much stronger role.  These subtleties are sometimes lost to the viewer when overwhelmed with colour.

WHAT INFLUENCE, IF ANY, HAS BRESSON HAD ON YOU?

TERRY: He taught us all the importance of a decisive moment – you don’t stage a great photograph, you wait for it.

JOHN: None, leave him alone!!

JIM: The lovely thing about Bresson’s images is that they are not about him, and that’s taught me a lot. He is the inverse of a celebrity photographer. His skill was to be the invisible eye that really records the people around him. It’s him, a camera, a lens, without lighting or fuss, making pictures.

JULIA: I suspect Henri Cartier – Bresson  influenced every photographer that I’ve ever loved and therefore indirectly has shaped the way I look at photography, such is the size and value of his contribution. Like every other photography student much of what I learnt was based on the world that he had helped create.

ADRIAN: I love Bresson’s quote: “To me, photography is the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event.” He introduced a thinking and intellectual rigor to photography whilst at the same time remaining whimsical in many ways. He helps remind me to take  seriously my craft of photography whilst remaining light- hearted and not so serious about myself.

HAS DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY REMOVED THE CIRCUMSTANCES FOR CAPTURING THE ‘DECISIVE MOMENT?’

TERRY: No. It allows photographers to shoot lazily, hundreds on a memory card and hope they have caught that magical shot. Film means you, the camera and your eye always have to be prepared, in synch. It keeps your ‘eye” in constant readiness. You can’t miss a shot changing films.

JOHN: Not for me,but seeing how, say, sports photographers shoot, yes it has.

JIM: In short, yes. The decisive moment has become the frame grab from the video stream. Bresson used a camera that needed its shutter re-cocked after ever frame. Today we can shoot thousands of frames of photography or video instantly and choose at our leisure. The process has become more of an edit in post than a conscious choice at the moment of action.

JULIA: I don’t think the photographic tool has any impact whatsoever.The decisive moment occurs regardless of which tool I use to capture it.I’m not passionate about digital but having taken a careful look around I’ve come to the conclusion that its the best tool for me at the moment with the way I work and the style I shoot. However I have a suspicion that its easier to make convincing digital colour photography than it is to make convincing digital B&W images.

ADRIAN: I love digital capture, however the down side for many non-professional photographers is that they no longer think about each specific photo captured,  they just seem to snap away in the hope that one image will be OK. The decisive moment is then selected from this series of images, so is it still a decisive moment ? I think it’s more now of the ‘random moment’ for most people. Every two minutes today we snap as many photos as the whole of humanity took in the 1800s. How many of these images are decisive ?

BRESSON SAW PHOTOGRAPHY AS ART;  AS ‘PUTTING ONE’S HEAD, ONE’S EYE AND ONE’S HEART ON THE SAME AXIS.’ DO YOU RELATE?

TERRY: I totally agree – all three go into a great photograph

JOHN: Art?  Yes, lots of people say no, but after doing it for almost 30 years, I love it more than ever. That is art

.

JIM: Great statement ! Art is a strong word, that is often overused for anything visual. For me that quote perhaps is more a description of the zone you have to be in to take proper, decent images. A place where the photographer is not being distracted by the client or brief but actually looking and seeing in a pure way.

JULIA: Absolutely. My images are a reflection of how I see the world. They come from my heart and my mind.

ADRIAN: Yes I agree.

Henri Cartier- Bresson, A Question of Colour, Somerset House, Strand, London, WC2R 1LA, November 8th 2012- 27th January 2013

Julia Fullerton Batten’s current and forthcoming exhibitions :
Solo show, “2005-2012″, Jenkins Johnson Gallery, San Francisco, until 8th Dec. 2012; Chris Beetles, “The Photographer – 2012″, until 9th Nov. 2012; Tokyo Arts Gallery, “Mothers and Daughters” opens June 2013; Swedish Museum of Photography, “Fotografiska” in 2014

Main Image Credit: Henri Cartier-Bresson, Harlem, New York, 1947, Gelatin silver print / printed 1970s
Image: 29.1 x 19.6 cm / Paper: 30.4 x 25.4 cm, © Henri Cartier-Bresson/Magnum Photos, Courtesy Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson

Did you always intend to work in both art and fashion – both cross over so much now.
I was actually thinking of doing photography. Art and fashion are crossing over in ways such as an artist being commissioned to design a range of clothes or accessories. The reason being, my guess, is that it gives the consumer a twist, maybe something unusual that they wouldn’t normally expect. Plus, it’s a way of being able to afford a work by the artist without having to pay large amounts of money. For example, a lot of people can now own something by David Hockney whereas before, that wasn’t the case.

Where do you get your ideas and inspiration?
From all over – from friends, people, travel, books, films, music and more. I have books on different genres: style, art and photography; such as Fashion & Surrealism, New Romantics, Hippie, Punk, Kurt Cobain Journals, Man Ray Paris – LA, David Bailey Birth of The Cool, The Sixties Art Scene in London. The list is so endless that friends tell me that my flat is like a bookstore. Films such as Heathers, True Romance, Pretty in Pink, Desperately Seeking Susan, Point Break and The Royal Tenenbaums – they all  have a distinctive style and remind me of parts of my youth. For example, Point Break, the surfer movie with Keanu Reeves, was the film I saw on my first date when I was 16.  A lot of those films were my favourites as a teenager but I loved them visually too.
Travel-wise, Mexico City, Istanbul, Japan, Barcelona, New York and I’m about to go to Berlin for the first time next month.

How would you describe your illustrative style?
Colourful and whimsical

Your felt tip illustrations are so popular – do you think that you’ll ever use other materials or media?
Yes, besides felt tip pens I do use paint for when I have exhibitions. I’m very interested in crafty handmade things too, so we shall see what evolves over time.

Can you tell us a little about your process – how do you go from idea to illustration and how long does it take?
Each project is always different. I start out with a brief that has been given by the client, I then jot down sketches and ideas in a notebook and I take it from there. It may take several attempts to get one drawing right. A project can take anywhere from three weeks to three months depending on the job itself. Also, lots of changes are inevitable and must be taken into account for each project.

How has the fashion industry changed since you first started working in it?
It has changed in the sense that there are more copies of designer clothes out there than ever before. It seems a shame that a designer has worked hard to get a collection together  to then have it ripped off with products that look cheap and tacky.

Do you draw for fun, or are you always working on a commission?
I always work on commission but I often wish I was the type of person that could draw for fun.

Which of your pieces are you the most proud of?
Topshop, Moet & Chandon, Z Spoke for Zac Posen and the book, He Said She Said

You’ve had international commissions – does each country respond differently to your work?
No, pretty much always the same.

Who do you most admire in the fashion industry?
The street photographer, Bill Cunningham, who is still working in his 80′s.

What next for you?
I’m in the stages of working on a blog about my life in Paris.

Daisy de Villeneuve – Illustrator, designer and writer and a judge at this year’s WGSN Global Fashion Awards.

Have your customers’ buying habits changed since the recession?
There has definitely been a change in consumers’ buying habits.  Shoppers look for value for money and that isn’t just about a lower price point, it’s about those simply amazing pieces, which make you feel incredible, or stand the test of time as part of your everyday wardrobe.   Every item that we buy as part of our edit must make the customer think wow, or that will fit perfectly into my wardrobe.

What’s the most popular item on my-wardrobe right now?
There are so many and it changes every day.  A continuous phenomenal seller is the Michael Kors gold chronograph watch, which has become quite a cult item.

Do you personally have the final say on which designers to feature on the site?
The buyers travel to the view the collections at the international showrooms and the catwalk shows to seek out new and exciting designers to add to the my-wardrobe.com designer mix.   We look for new and exciting names which offer our customer something different. I will always present new brands and collections, which I think are interesting to the buyers but I have complete trust in their judgement.

Do you see the site as your baby or a business?
Both.  As an entrepreneur your business is like another child and you give it 24/7 focus to help it grow and mature. You also realise that if your business is going to become strong and well-rounded, you need to ensure it gets external influence to help mould and shape its growth just like a child. That is why you bring in experts in their field and it’s why we appointed a new CEO ( former Harrods Direct director David Worby ) to drive the growth of the business both here in the UK and internationally allowing me to step back into my role as Founder.

How has the fashion industry changed since you started in 2007?
The internet has revolutionised the way people can access and consume fashion.  From fashion shows being streamed live, to click-to-buy from the catwalk, social media channels opening up conversations with designers and influencers to photography-led platforms such as Instagram and Pinterest influencing what we buy, it’s a new world which has in turn altered the consumer demand and expectations from retailers.

Who are your top three designers – and why?
Acne – I love masculine tailoring and Acne do this really well.  My favourite blazers are all by Acne.
Preen – every season the collection gets better and better with beautifully cut dresses that grasp every curve, to exquisitely cute coats, jackets and trousers.
10 Crosby Derek Lam – a new diffusion line for my-wardrobe.com by one of New York’s favourite designers Derek Lam. Simplistic separates with interesting novelty twists such as exaggerated peplums and bold prints make each piece a talking point.

You sold your house to start the site. What made you so certain that it would work? And would you do it again?
I always knew it would work and that utter belief in the opportunity that we had to create a global brand spurred me on.  I would do it all again tomorrow.

Where do you get your ideas and inspiration?
I’m inspired by so much and so many people around me. I’m in a privileged position to work with such passionate and inspiring people, while the evolving digital world continues to inspire me when it comes to innovation and developing the experience for our shopper.

What do you think of designer/ high street collaborations and would you ever work with a designer for an exclusive collection? Who would you like this to be?
High street collaborations have been a way to create cut through and standout in what is now a cluttered market place. We work with our designers on exclusive collaborations every season to present new and exclusive pieces and collections created especially for our customers.

What are the four most worn items in your wardrobe?
Joseph leather leggings, Acne blazer, Preen coat, Prada red shoes

Sarah Curran, Founder of my-wardrobe.com and a judge at this year’s WGSN Global Fashion Awards. the winners of  which will be announced at a ceremony hosted by Cat Deeley at The Savoy on 5th November