Reading/Writing-10/11/2009

 

I finished Franco Moretti's' theoretical study of literature, probably one of the first books that the Princeton professor published in English. I thoroughly enjoyed it. A lot of the argument is complex and I will take several reads before I feel confident about his arguments. I particularly like the way he draws on a range of traditions while remaining within the large orbit of modern Marxist theory. The last two chapters discussing Joyce's 'Ulysses' and the conservative poet T.S. Elliot's 'The Waste Land'. Both works explore the subterranean mental worlds of the post world war one era. The era between the two world wars is such an interesting and frightening time of the 20^th century. I am following Moretti's book with Christopher Hitchens collected essays on writers "Unacknowledged Legislation". I continue to read Hilary Mantel's 'Wolf Hall' on my Kindle. I really enjoy using the Kindle for reading. It also has a large dictionary that is proving useful for reading philosophical writing.

 

Finally making a start on a memoir I have been thinking about for a while. Tentatively titled 'The first LSD trip – August 1973' exploring what was for me a monumental day in my life.

West Coast USA: Powerhouse of Rock Culture

A REVIEW OF THE CD BOX SET: L.A NUGGETS: WHERE THE ACTION IS 1966-1968'. Over the last few years, the CD reissue house Rhino Records has been widely expanding the classic garage music collection of 'Nuggets: Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era 1965-1968' put together by Jac Holzman, founder of Elektra Records, and the late Lenny Kaye, later lead guitarist for the Patti Smith Group. This masterful original collection paid homage to the music of the period and was very influential in the creation of the Punk Rock movement which grew out of the demise of the first rock music wave of the 1960s (which had grown lazy and self indulgent). 'Nuggets' brought to the attention of the new generation of musicians in the late 1970s the deep rock grooves that made the music of the 1960s truly interesting. L.A. Nuggets is now the fifth or sixth 4 cd collection issued by Rhino. The last two reissues have seen a change with the recognition that rock music and rock culture always begins and renews itself from regions and from there spreads its influence and fan bases nationally and internationally. This collection is based on Los Angeles rock culture from 65 to 68. Last years release was SAN FRANCISCO NUGGETS: LOVE IS THE SONG WE SING 1965-1970, another wonderful 4cd box set.

Both of these collections have very impressive packaging. CD manufacturers, facing stiff competition from mp3 type downloads have started to really improve the packaging of music. For years after the demise of the record, customers were treated like mugs with poor sound quality digital transfers and the most revolting packaging. Business managers of the big music corporations obviously were not fans of music listening. If they were they would have understood just how important a cover and its contents are to making a purchasing decision. A similar thing might be said about books and booksellers today, who are now facing the threat of ebook downloads. Both the San Francisco and LA Nuggetts collections come in a large book format, with great layout and photography as well as sets of essays about the era and details about the bands performing on the various tracks. These books are a sensual delight to touch and hold and smell, something you might want to do while you are listening to the great music on the CDs!

San Francisco and LA had very distinct rock music styles. It might have been the differences in the kind of drugs that were popular at the time (e.g. Sand Francisco-LSD; LA-speed and both obviously had THC). Perhaps a more significant factor was to do with the musical styles that were around in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Both regions forged different styles of rock music that brought in the blues / folk / jazz / Tex-Mex / rockabilly / Indian raga / country / Cajun in different configurations. The musicians in the individual regions would then interact, from which a distinct regional style would evolve. The regions would then become the platform from which bands and styles would launch themselves into the world. West coast USA in the 1960s, with two and possibly three (I'm thinking of Seattle) musical regions became a musical and cultural powerhouse the like of which we have never seen before (or are likely to see again, given the changes to the structure of the music industry). The list of famous names are simply too long to list here, but they were key personnel in the emergence of all the musical styles we enjoy today. These bands and individuals 'restructured' the styles they drew on, in the process creating something completely novel, completely 'out of the way'. Today we take many musical sounds and chord progressions for granted. The fact that we are capable of recognising the cacophony of sounds as 'music' is entirely due to those who pioneered the styles, those who experimented, and those who were willing to push audio envelopes on stage and in the sound studio. An album like Sgt. Peppers would have been unlistenable to all but the most sophisticated experimental jazz and orchestral players in the 1930's and 1940s. Now we hear it without thinking at the supermarket. Led Zeppelins' 'Stairway to Heaven' was once only for rather ripped rock fans. Now you also hear it in supermarkets and coffee shops.

The San Francisco Nuggets' collection is far more cerebral than the LA collection. There was more of a tendency to play around with sound, slowing it in odd moments, twisting it around, drifting around and then shooting off to some distant musical galaxy. The LA sound strikes me as less the head, more the abdomen and below. It's got much more of a driving rock sound and puts you more quickly in the mood for dancing. Dancing -of course- is the essential corollary to rock music. In the end, the only way you can judge rock music is through feeling. Does it feel good, does it turn you on, does it make you wanna-wanna. The remastering of the sound in these collections is another impressive feature. Forty years or more later and the sound still hits you like a well cured joint in an open air festival out in the country on a sunny day. Relax and enjoy this music. Get it through your local dealer or through Amazon (the music I mean).

Sunday, 1 November 2009

The Strength and Weaknesses of the Radical Left in Latin America

The Strengths of the Radical Left in Latin America.

Over the last ten years Latin American politics has shifted dramatically to the left. This will not be a permanent move, despite its prolonged nature (around 15 years at the time of writing). Even if there is a return of the right, it is likely that much of the lefts political changes will remain, unless we have a disastrous return to the authoritarian politics (for example, Chile under Pinochet). The return of the left and the radical left has been marked by two distinct changes in its 'hegemonic discourse', once dominated by a unique mixture of Communism, Populism, and romantic egalitarianism. The demise of 'Communist' politics and Stalinist political economy has given the opportunity for the Latin American radical left to rethink its economic and social agendas. It has implicitly returned to the more flexible perspective adopted by the Bolsheviks under the New Economic Policy of the early 1920s. It implicitly or explicitly recognises that capitalism cannot be 'abolished' by the executive or legislative authority. Capitalism is a fact that we must learn to live with and use for the foreseeable future. The focus of the Latin American left has shifted from capitalism to the role and activity of the state. The state will have the key role in social and economic progress, both as a manager of the business of citizens and the way in which citizens can participate in the organization of the business of the state. The second change in the discourse of the Latin American left has been the acceptance of political pluralism and the recognition that political struggles can only be fought on the terrain that allows citizens to democratically legitimise a government and allows citizens the ability to change their minds about the way in which their social lives are organised.

The Weaknesses of the Radical Left in Latin America

There are two major weaknesses in the current radical left turn in Latin America. The first is related to a global systemic phenomenon: the decline and organizational atrophy of political parties in general. (i.e. of all, not just left wing parties). There are large political parties of the radical left in Latin America, but these organisations are less 'political party' and more 'political movement'. 'Movement' and 'Party' are distinct organizational phenomenon. The former is a much looser political formation, where the members of the movement only have limited and indirect means of influencing decisions and key decision makers. There appears to be a chronic inability in Latin America to transform 'movement' into 'party'. The second weakness is interlinked to the first: Latin American popular movements have a historical tendency to be reliant on 'the Leader', usually a charismatic individual at the head of a movement. It often seems that political leaders are unable to get the hint provided by the great Nelson Mandela: that hanging around for too long at the centre of power is a bad idea (witness the rotten corpse that is Robert Mugabe); that ten or so years should probably be the limit of an individuals life at the top, that there is a time when 'the Leader' should go back to the farm to tend the corn and the cattle and hand power over to another generation. Of course, the only way the leader can do that and have a successful transition is if the virtues he or she possesses can be passed on through a strong, resilient, well organised and deeply networked political party.

Wednesday, 26 August 2009

 

China Threatens Tibet’s Water Supply.

New Left Review 58 (link below) has a lead article on water policy in the Central and East Asian region by UC Irvine's Kenneth Pomeranz 'The Great Himalayan Watershed'. Its a frightening survey of the resource management plans of the major states in the region (China; India; Pakistan). Current and projected water shortages are compelling these states (especially China and India) to embark on major water transfer programmes that are threatening the lives, livelihoods and regions of those who live upstream. That is combined with the growing demand for hydropower, ironically driven by demands to slow down the building of coal fired power stations in regions with vastly increasing projected demands for electricity consumption (like China's Guangdong Province the heart of the PRC's manufacturing industry).

Of great concern are Chinas plans for dams in Tibet. Tibet holds 30 percent of Chinas fresh water supply:

.........."Even the water-engineering projects that will genuinely help millions in northern and eastern China—and perhaps others, if they serve to curb the country's carbon emissions and future food imports—have serious implications for people who live in the regions where they will be built. Tibetans and other ethnic minorities in the far southwest are likely to be the most affected. In May 2009, an unconfirmed report by the Tibetan government-in-exile stated that at least six Tibetan women were injured when security forces opened fire on them as they protested against a hydro project on the Tibet–Sichuan border. One issue here is that of human tampering with lakes and rivers that Tibetans hold sacred, such as the large dam at Yamdrok Tso. A massive dam—40,000 megawatts, or almost twice the capacity of Three Gorges—proposed at the great bend in the Yalong Zangbo would again wreak a dramatic transformation on a holy site, in order to create power and water supplies that would mostly go to far-away Han Chinese."

........................"Meanwhile, the project poses serious risks for the traditional livelihoods of many people. Road-building and railway-building—particularly the Qinghai–Tibet highway and the railroad that runs near it, completed in 2006—seem to have substantially degraded the permafrost layer in adjacent areas; the permafrost, in turn, protects a series of underground lakes, so that damaging it is likely to exacerbate an already worrisome drying trend in the region. A Chinese surveying team recently reported that some of the sources of the Yangzi itself are drying up, and the area is turning to desert. Wetlands and grasslands that are important to the large numbers of livestock herders in Tibet have already shrunk quite significantly; this is likely to accelerate the process. Existing dams in Yunnan appear to be interfering with local fisheries, and new ones pose significant threats to China's greatest concentration of biodiversity. Since much of this region is seismically active, the risk of an earthquake precipitating a catastrophic dam failure and sudden floods cannot be dismissed."

.............. "Evidence is meanwhile mounting that, thanks to climate change, the water supplies all these projects seek to tap are less dependable than one might hope. A 2008 report published in Geophysical Research Letters noted that recent samples taken from Himalayan glaciers were missing two markers that are usually easy to find, reflecting open-air nuclear tests in 1951–52 and 1962–63. The reason: the glacier apparently had lost any ice built up since the mid-1940s, melting not just from the edges but from the top as well. And since the Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change estimates that the Himalayan highlands will warm at about twice the average global rate over the next century, there is every reason to think the situation will get worse. One estimate suggests that a third of Himalayan glaciers will disappear by 2050, and two thirds by 2100. Current models predict that this will happen much faster in the western than the eastern Himalayas; the situation for Pakistan and northwest India is thus particularly grim, with an initial windfall period of increased flows to be followed by a devastating loss of water in the already declining Indus, Sutlej and other rivers. [71]If that scenario is right, then even if all the engineering challenges of the South-to-North Water Transfer can be solved—and even if we ignore the costs to other users of these waters—the resulting benefits might prove short-lived."

http://www.newleftreview.org/?page=article&view=2788

The Significance of Woodstock.

Why did Woodstock become such a celebrated moment in the cultural history of the 1960s? There are several reasons for this. Most commentary has focused on the music and the cultural shifts that accompanied it. Less discussed are the technical and financial reasons for this one event becoming such a symbol of the era. Why was the symbolic moment not the Monterey festival of 1967, an equally important cultural event that has taken a historical 'back seat' compared to Woodstock? As is often the case with many events that become highly symbolic, it was the 'accidental' coming together of technical, financial, musical and cultural factors that made it significant.

The size of the crowd and its generally peaceful nature drew the attention of the mass media during and after the event. There was also the further proliferation of television and technical improvements like the introduction of colour since the Monterey festival. That was the first wave of Woodstock's road to becoming a symbolic moment of the 1960s. That was followed by a very good movie that employed the novel use of hand held 16mm cameras followed by post production editing in the hands of brilliant craftspeople like Martin Scorsese (now the great director) and Thelma Schoonmaker. They also introduced another (at the time) revolutionary innovation of the split screen to feature shots of the musicians from different angles.

The movie was accompanied by a great soundtrack, made possible by the sound engineer Eddie Kramer, who recorded the entire concert on two, state of the art 8 track, one inch, tape recording machines. Kramer is the most important recording engineer the golden era of rock music (working most notably with Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, Traffic, the Beatles and the Rolling Stones). Kramer's work has made possible the several revisions to the official Woodstock recordings. The 40^th anniversary release (2009) of the six CD compilation is in many ways a return to Kramer's original recording, minimising the post production filtering that tried to cut out or drastically reduce the extraneous sounds (hiss, popping, clicks, helicopter) that are part and parcel of any live recording. Unfortunately, the filtering in the three record album and a sequel, as well as the later CD releases impoversihed the sound quality of the music, often reducing it to a thin, mono sound when a full spectrum of sound was available from Kramers tapes. The 40^th anniversary release gives the listener a much greater appreciation of the musicians who made the rhythm that drove the songs, especially bass and drums. Kramer –still alsive and working- was recently called in by Warner Brothers to mix the Blu-Ray re-release of the Woodstock movie which features 5.1 digital surround sound. Now that would be a treat to experience if you had the equipment at home!

The movie was a great success, winning a huge, audience and an academy award for editing. It featured in cinemas all over the world, allowing many millions to closely experience some of the music from the festival. It was release alongside a with a triple album (and a sequel) that sold in the millions. That way, this particular concert was embedded in the hearts and minds of a generation- another marketing innovation of its time. The albums became a compilation that registered the sound of a generation. Forty years later, with all the nostalgia that comes with growing old, Woodstock came to represent the best years of their lives for the teenagers of the late 1960s, as well as a sonic rediscovery of great music for the generations of the 21^st century.

Partly because of the unexpectedly gigantic size of the crowd and the accompanying chaos, the managers lost control of the incoming crowd, turning the event into a 'free' concert. Behind the event (of course) was the financial imperative (for the two New York financiers who took a big gamble on the festival) to make money from a concert that many thought had become a financial disaster. In fact, it did not lose as much money as the producers initially feared, because they failed to take into account ticket sales from regional centres that were retrieved much later (remember, this was the era before networked computers).

This event is a good case study for business school graduates. What began as a minor financial disaster turned out to be such a successful money-spinner that forty years after it occurred, corporations are still profiting from it. Perhaps the major financial lesson from Woodstock is that with careful financial planning and negotiation of contractual arrangements there is no reason why events like this should not have been free in the first place, with profits made from post event sales and the reputation gained from having played there.

Of course, the MOST important thing about Woodstock was the music. The producers of the latest version of Woodstock said that covering the whole three days would take about 30 CDs. Given the 'nostalgia market' (we fifty something's with a bit of spare cash) I would not be surprised if a box set of that proportion would be released sometime before we start fertilising weeds.

Rock music styles begin as regional styles. For example: US west coast styles coalesce around, say, northern West Coast-Seattle (think Hendrix; Nirvana); Central-San Francisco (think all those I list in the next paragraph); Southern-Los Angeles to the Mexican border and beyond (think Beach Boys; Byrds; Ry Cooder; Los Lobos). Most of the musicians that come of out these regional traditions don't get past local fame. The jump to prominence (so that people in such faraway places like Adelaide get to know and love their music) starts with airplay and promotion. A lucky few find their music tied to a major historical event like Woodstock, which bundles their music from a regional style into something new, different and more widespread.

The music of Woodstock brought to prominence a second tier of musicians who were working at the same time as some of the big acts (like Hendrix) and consolidated their music in the minds of the late sixties youth. For example, many of the musicians who created 'The San Francisco Sound', or to be more precise, the Haight-Ashbury sound (Haight-Asbury is an inner suburb of San Francisco) became household names for young people all over the world. The list is impressive: Grateful Dead; Jefferson Airplane; Santana; Sly and the Family Stone; Country Joe and the Fish; Credence Clearwater Revival were among those who played at Woodstock. It also made other musicians like Crosby, Stills Nash and Young a household name. There were also a number of UK musicians who brought their particular musical styles and were suddenly catapulted in the rock music's hall of fame: Joe Cocker most notably, but also Ten Years After, one of the finest blues-rock bands to have come out of the 1960s, as well as the revival of the flagging reputation of The Who. These distinct regional styles were bundled together at Woodstock and were projected into the 1970s music scene all over the world as 'Woodstock Music'.

What is so impressive about this music was its sheer diversity. A blues band like Canned Heat was not just doing covers of John Lee Hooker (they were doing that, including an album with the man himself), they often added a mystical element from the LSD/marijuana culture they were drenched in, even incorporating the Indian musical styles that became associated with the psychedelic era with the blues. Sly and the Family Stone opened up a musical tradition that triumphed in what we call 'cross-over' music (i.e. the merging of rock and soul). Michael Jackson/ Quincy Jones's magnificent 'Thriller' album can be traced back to Sly Stone (and later the band known as Parliament/ Funkadelic). There was also a huge acoustic side to Woodstock: Ritchie Havens; Arlo Guthrie; Country Joe; Melanie; Ravi Shankar; Crosby Stills Nash and Young among others. These are musical names that are still familiar to many people forty years after the event!

In the end, what was important about the music of Woodstock was the evolutionary pathways it opened for the rock music styles that followed. They formed a new set of 'genetic' combinations that allowed completely novel musical styles to evolve into the future. That's the best thing about rock music: it's like a virus that keeps mutating into something different. That's why it still remains the music of the working class. Just when big corporations try to capture the sounds of a generation, it slips from their fingers because a million garage bands out there are mutating some new style that young people love. I wonder if there is there is some sort of lesson for radical left politics here.

Friday, 11 September 2009

The Strengths of the New Left in Latin America.

Over the last ten years Latin American politics has shifted dramatically to the left. This will not be a permanent move, despite its prolonged nature (around 15 years at the time of writing). Even if there is a return of the right, it is likely that much of the lefts political changes will remain, unless we have a disastrous return to the authoritarian politics (for example, Chile under Pinochet). The return of the left and the radical left has been marked by two distinct changes in its 'hegemonic discourse', once dominated by a unique mixture of Communism, Populism, and romantic egalitarianism. The demise of 'Communist' politics and Stalinist political economy has given the opportunity for the Latin American radical left to rethink its economic and social agendas. It has implicitly returned to the more flexible perspective adopted by the Bolsheviks under the New Economic Policy of the early 1920s. It implicitly or explicitly recognises that capitalism cannot be 'abolished' by the executive or legislative authority. Capitalism is a fact that we must learn to live with and use for the foreseeable future. The focus of the Latin American left has shifted from capitalism to the role and activity of the state. The state will have the key role in social and economic progress, both as a manager of the business of citizens and the way in which citizens can participate in the organization of the business of the state. The second change in the discourse of the latin American left has been the acceptance of political pluralism and the recognition that political struggles can only be fought on the terrain that allows citizens to democratically legitimise a government and allows citizens the ability to change their minds about the way in which their social lives are organised.

Saturday, 22 August 2009

‘Nazi Literature in the Americas’ by Roberto Bolano

It is two o’clock in the morning and I just finished Roberto Bolano’s novel ‘Nazi Literature in America’ , an imaginary series of short biographies of right wing literary figures, completed with an imaginary bibliography. This work has been praised in many reviews following its publication. It’s funny, sardonic and offers some impressive views of the fascist mindset. While not confined to Latin America, most of the ‘biographies’ are from that region.

Latin America would have to be the most ‘political’ of all the continents on earth. At this time it is overwhelmingly of the left and is a pioneer in the ‘recapitulation’ of radical left politics in the post communist era. But this is a continent that has suffered some terrible tragedies in the hands of the extreme right, primarily from military coups and paramilitary gangs. Murder, torture, rape and generalised brutality are the main methods of control by the far right. By comparison, the excesses of the radical left have been far less brutal and much less generalised. The radical right lives far less on the margins of many Latin American societies. Its ideas and characters are often woven into the cultural fabric of many of its major societies such as Brazil, Argentina and Chile.

Bolano’s work uses fiction to explore that universe of the extreme right that continues to live in Latin America. As an author of the left, Bolano uses his pen to attack and expose the emptiness and depravity of the culture of the extreme right. Bolano was literally one of the victims of the right, suffering imprisonment under Pinochet and then exile. What I particularly like about Bolano is his continuing adherence to the world view of the radical left but one that is tempered by the experience of defeat. You won’t find a leftist cheer squad in his work. There is a refreshing level of darkness and cynicism as well as rays of hope in the distance. Curiously, Trotsky and even Trotsky’s daughter make these impromptu appearances in his work.

Bolano is amazingly well read. His historical knowledge is vast and he has a deep understanding of language and poetry. His style is fast and very modern. It draws you in. You can feel these same qualities coming through the different translators (the original is in Spanish) of novels like this one and the novel that made him very famous ‘The Savage Detectives’.

I haven’t felt this good about a novelist since I started reading Ernest Hemmingway in the early 1980s, during a stint was a full time worker for a radical left organization in Sydney. I became so engrossed in him that I had to read all of his novels and many of his short stories, as well as his biography and selected letters. I have fond memories of reading Hemmingway outside the Town Hall station, or on various trains to Newcastle and Wollongong to visit local branches in those cities.

Tuesday, 14 July 2009

The Next Problem: what to read next.

Of course, now the problem is finding the next book to read. I thought of having another bite of the Bolano cherry. Then I thought maybe a history of the United States in the depression era. Then my mind moved on to this very good deep study of the Chinese Cultural Revolution. From there I thought of reading a very good study of the Balkan Wars of the 1990s by Susan Woodward. Then I thought, no, what about a selection of Freud’s writings put together by the historian Peter Gay. Finally I decided on Manning Clarks history of Australia, Volume 1 “From the Earliest Times to the Age of Macquarie”.

Tuesday, 14 July 2009

The Australian Right breaks apart.

 

In Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa's beautiful and melancholy novel 'The Leopard' (set Sicily during the Risorgimento of the 19^th century) , the rebel republican leader Tancredi reminds the old Aristocrat Don Fabrizio "If we want things to stay as they are...things have to change." This is a lesson that a large section of the right wing in Australia is refusing to accept. In the United Kingdom, the Conservative Party has understood this and gone a long way towards adjusting its style and substance to meet the challenges of 'late-capitalist depression politics'

When the neo-conservative government of John Howard was defeated in the last federal election in 2007, I thought that this might have signalled the opening up of major divisions in the right wing of Australian politics. There were those who continued to believe in the possibility that the politics of the neo-conservative old order could be maintained and those who understood that the politics of the right wing would need to undergo some major changes, primarily in appearance, but also in form. The elevation of Malcolm Turnbull to the leadership opened up the possibility that a transition to the new way of doing things may have been possible. The most basic change would have been the acceptance of some sort of climate change policy, to send a signal that the Right wing has come to understand the basic technical imperatives of maintaining a capitalist economy in an era of production induced climate catastrophe. Yet the Right is incapable of doing this. They have become the prisoners of the Neanderthals of the Australian capitalist class, the mining industry.

Unfortunately, for the Right, the possibility of making such a transition is proving to be very difficult. In fact, it may lead to the fracturing of right wing politics in Australia and the possibility of a decade's long spell on the opposition benches. This is what happened to the Labor Party in the 1950s and early 1960s, when an anti-communist split engineered by the leadership of the Catholic Church in Australia resulted in Labour being in opposition for twenty years. Julia Gillard's succession to becoming Australia's first female prime minister is virtually guaranteed, once the flatulent prime ministership of Kevin Rudd exhausts itself. Despite her drift to the right, I think the Gillard years will be far more interesting than the –hopefully short- reign of Kevin 'fair bloody shake' Rudd.

Monday, 13 July 2009

Black and White Illuminations

.

Working nights is always a test for my mental state. I can never get enough sleep during the day and the sleep deprivation that follows affects the way I think. Over the last two weeks I have been plagued by winter flu. Combine that with lack of sleep and encounters with sweet green vapours and you are in the right place for some mind altering changes to your thought processes. Sometimes I am make downright silly decisions. Many years ago, when I was a month into night duty I made the stupid decision to sell a very good paperback collection of Franz Kafka's writings. Admittedly they were paperbacks and recently published. I had simply got it into my head that I would replace the collection with hardback editions. More than fifteen years later and I still have not replaced the collection.

Never the less, putting your mind under pressure in this way is not entirely bad. Sometimes it opens up new vistas of thought. A light shines on some darkened corner of your mind, bringing to life a thought stream that changes what you do in your daily life. Over the last three weeks I experienced such a moment of illumination, a re-discovery of black and white photography.

In the early 1980's I spent several years studying a course in photography at one of our now non existent colleges of advanced education. It was not a degree course, but I was lucky enough to learn from two very good photographic artists, Ed Douglas and Fiona Hall (just when she was starting on the road to her artistic fame). Most of our work was in Black and White and my darkroom passion was for Black and White rather than colour processes. This period was one the highlights of my life. I took thousands of pictures, many of which I am still to develop. I continued my interest in photography and the darkroom, but during the 1990s it receded to the point where, by the end of the decade I lost serious interest in photography. I moved with the times into the new world of digital photography and out of the darkroom, replaced by the PC and the inkjet printer.

For many years, the pixel held its dazzling allure before my eyes. I marvelled at the prints I could get from my four mega (then six, then ten) mega pixel camera. The colours were so vivid. As the years passed there were more and more mega pixels added to the microprocessors in cameras. The printers became ever more refined and computer screens became ever more vivid. But how far would this all go? Vivid colour is now everywhere, from photographs to television and computer screens. They are even found in electronic picture frames. '3D' imagery will soon be a commonplace. Our lives are completely saturated with vivid colour. Images are 'super-real' illusions. We imagine these images are realistic replications of what we experience, say, when we look at a tree in the park or a view from the mountaintop. But they are not realistic. They are simply overloaded colour signals that manufacturers tell you are accurate representations of the reality you are photographing. As the technology evolves and the manufacturers of photographic technology want you to buy their new products, these definitions of colour signals change.

During the era of film stock, people seriously interested in photography understood that the colour and 'texture' of film was a matter of personal taste. There was not a 'one true' colour. There were fans of Kodak (I for example was a big fan of Tri-X 400 ASA black a white film) in colour and black and white. Some were fans of Kodakchrome 64 or Ektachrome; others were fans of Agfa, Fuji or Ilford film and paper. Some people were fans of Cibachrome colour or Polaroid. Now many of those differences in preference have moved onto the PC and to the calibration of printers.

The shift to digital technology has put too much of a premium on the rise and rise of the pixel intensity of the photograph. The uniqueness of still and moving images has been destroyed by its presence everywhere. It has become so tiresome to look that we have simply stopped looking altogether. We have shut our minds to it in order to hold back the sensation that your brain is being drowned by all this colour stimulation.

A few weeks ago I took my son to his tennis lesson on a cold Sunday morning at 8.30. The courts are in a lovely big eastern suburbs suburban park and I decided to go and take some photographs, switching the camera to black and white. As I was framing the shots on the large LCD screen on the back of the camera I found myself thinking again about light and shadow, contrast and the texture of black. The point where I started thinking about the qualities of the colour black was probably the moment where the world of black and white photography that I was once so passionate about suddenly started returning into my head. With my mind partially reduced to jelly by sleep deprivation I found myself picking up this thread and running with it.

It wasn't long before I started remembering the emotions that were stirred by the great masters of black and white photography: W. Eugene Smith; Eugene Aget; Henri-Cartier Bresson; Edward Weston; Paul Strand and Ansell Adams to name a few. Looking at their most famous images made it possible to start looking again. I found that black and white was telling me more about what I was looking at than the colour images I was drowning with in my everyday life. I found that I wanted to start looking, start looking out instead of in. The world of light and shadow suddenly opened up. I wanted to start taking pictures and start enjoying the 'textures of black' on a white background. The camera started to matter again.

Sunday, 12 July 2009