Blog Post #76

David Gleave Exhibition and Internet Warriors

Before Christmas last year my good friend Jos Treen and I decided to go to the David Gleave “Rescued Time” exhibition in Manchester Central Library. It was then that Jos mentioned that he was friends with David and would see if he would meet up with us on the day to chat about the exhibition. Thankfully David agreed to meet us.

On Wednesday this week I headed out from Derby by train to Manchester via Sheffield, arriving just after noon, and Jos was waiting for me in Piccadilly station. After a short walk from the station we sat and had a catch up in the library cafe. Shortly after, David arrived and we sat chatting about our photography, zines and experiences we have had on our individual photography journeys. During our conversation David mentioned that he very much saw his role when out and about with his camera as being one of a guy with a camera recording history. This immediately resonated with me as I am of the same opinion. I was also interested to hear that he was a Ricoh GR camera user and had been for years. All of his work is in digital format, mainly black and white, but when the subject merits it (such as his travel photography), he will use colour. He told me that he shot exclusively in the Raw format and spent little time on post processing. In fact he said that if he needs to spend more than 45 seconds on an image in post processing he moves on to the next shot.

The exhibition itself comprised of numerous prints of varying sizes, almost all in black and white, covering a large wall space. The lighting was excellent as the walls were adjacent to the large natural light windows and this showed the prints off very well. Each shot had a story and David took us through each one. The first thing I noticed was that the exhibition was all about the people he had photographed with the portraits having been taken at close range and as such were very striking. Many of the photos were of bands from Manchester over the years as David, a musician himself, has had very close links to the vibrant Manchester music scene over the years. Some of the faces were instantly recognisable like Noel Gallagher and Sean Ryder but there were also shots of lesser known bands too. I truly enjoyed talking with David and Jos as we moved through the exhibition and I have taken away a lot from it.

Pete, Jos and David

The exhibition will be on at Manchester Central Library until 31st March and I would recommend that you endeavour to get along to see it. If you want to see an example of what is in the exhibition and more of David’s work, you can visit his website at https://davidgleavephoto.com/

As we said our goodbyes, Jos and I decided to go for a beer. One last piece of advice that David gave us was to suggest a pub that he thought we would like “The Briton’s Protection”.

This was my kind of pub, real ales (including stout), and a bit of history too. It is the only place in Manchester to commemorate the 1819 protest for parliamentary reform, which took place just outside the pub’s front door. A total of 15 demonstrators were killed and 700 more were injured by the sabre-wielding British cavalry who charged the 80,000 strong crowd. This was known as The Peterloo Massacre and a large mural stands proudly on the walls of the pub.

The beer was just too good to have one and a second round seemed the right thing to do. Once we had put the world to rights and finished our beer we took a walk back to Piccadilly past the magnificent Midland Hotel building which to me was far superior to the modern high rise buildings who’s shadow it now sits in.

My thanks go to Jos and David for a great day out in Manchester and to the Railway Gods for having all of my trains and connections on time.

Internet Warriors

Earlier in the week I noticed on Facebook that a new group had been suggested for me. I can’t remember the name of it exactly but it was to do with memories of old Govan in Glasgow. There are already a few of these so why we need another one is beyond me. Anyway, I noticed that someone had posted up a few of my Govan archive photos. I mentioned in the thread that these were my photos and had been reproduced without permission and even without a photo credit. Other groups have had the decency to ask and I have granted permission so long as they credit me as the photographer which they always do.

I tend to stay up quite late at night so just before I closed down my Mac a couple of nights ago a PM popped up on Facebook from someone I don’t know. It was someone (possibly and Admin.) from the group I had just posted on. Although this person didn’t know me the PM contained nothing but abusive comments about me, my post and questioned why I felt the need to be credited as they were in the public domain so belonged to everyone now. I replied trying to inform him about common courtesy and why people put copyright messages on their website, where these had been ripped from. That just angered him more and resulted in more personal abuse. He closed with the comment, “good luck with sewing Facebook” and then blocked me before I could reply. His inability to spell suing told me a lot and I had a good laugh in the end. When encountering keyboard warriors I never get worked up or annoyed because it’s what they do. Never rise to their bait. It could just be some sad person, recently arrived home from the pub drunk, after being bullied by their mates.

Now, I am not naive to the point where I think that nobody will copy my photos for their own or other use. I sat on my archive shots for over 40 years but the day I posted some to the internet I knew that they were no longer under my control. I often wonder how professional photographers can make any money these days through plagiarism and people pirating the use of their images. Thankfully I don’t depend on photography for my main source of income, but it would be nice and polite for anyone posting copies of my work, or any photographers work, to at least give a photo credit.

I hope you have enjoyed this blog post and thank you for reading it. If you want to comment on this blog post please do so below or you can contact me by using the “Contact Me” facility in the website header.

Pete