James D. Clark

Last week I went to an informal crit, kindly put on by Emily and Anna at Contact Editions. The lure came from a.) wanting to keep my brain ticking over after the rigours of a day job, b.) to seek some real-world opinions away from the safety of Uni, and c.) for the pleasure of a cold beer. The inspirational Hin Chua was at hand to show a new edit of After The Fall, as well as casting his eye over what I had to offer.

We discussed…

…what makes a good car wreck photo:

© Hin Chua

© Me

…the slight irritation of this lamp-post:

…the importance of text and how I wouldn’t have taken this shot had it not been there:

…how I need to cut out the flab:

…how this is pretty damn cool:

…how I will find better ‘versions’ of many of these images in the future.

…as well as touching on the epic How much wall? debate

It was also a pleasure to meet a couple of very talented recent graduates – Luke and Nik, who work together under the guise of El-Plus-En. Their  ‘Principles & Theories of Space-time Manipulation’ is a surreal, playful and spontaneous attempt to create a tangible response to something which no-one has yet experienced.

© El Plus En

Their first body of work, ‘Fade In Darkness‘ is equally inventive, although with a more sinister edge. It is available as a zine from Teeluze Press publishing.

© El Plus En