Of Death and Awkward Monsters

AN INTERVIEW WITH LIAM LYNCH[*]

 

South African documentary photographer, Liam Lynch, is only 29 but has already received national recognition for his work in the Amstel Salute to Success, appeared on SABC 2’s Our Nation in Colour and had his work appear on the cover of Time magazine.

 

While studying political journalism at Pretoria Technikon in 1996, Lynch began photographing and documenting racial campus clashes and his work was soon seen in national newspapers. Once his diploma was completed, he began freelancing as a news photographer but soon became frustrated and turned towards photographic editing and layout and design.

 

As his work started to focus more on the urban community life which revolved around youth and counter cultures and music, Lynch started working at South African History Online. He became involved in “several key projects” (www.southphoto.com), shot some socio-economic works for the South African Department of Public Works and the Development of South Africa before joining South Photographs in 2003, and once again pursuing freelance work.

 

His most current work is a personal project, “Son… Take a Good Look Around”, which was shown by Nedbank as a work in progress as part of their “Profiled Artists” platform, and which documents the working class community from which Lynch came.

 

Here in an exclusive interview, Lynch speaks about his photography, travelling with Fokofpolisiekar and what inspires him.

 

Your career is going rather well. What, for you, are the highlights of it so far?

There have been a few… I don’t think I define highlights by any significant achievements, but rather what amounts to a personal milestone. On one level, it is a source of pride to see a photograph of mine in Time magazine (A photograph, incidentally, that was shot for another story in another newspaper and then initially rejected. It was thanks to South that it got published at all, in no less than Time). On another, it’s great to be shooting at a music festival like Oppikoppi, covering everyone from Mafikizolo to Fokofpolisiekar, Rian Malan to Pro Kid, and then have a total stranger come up to me from the crowd, recognise me, and tell me how much they appreciate my work. In this particular instance, the “fan” was a matric pupil planning on studying journalism, and she was enthusiastic as to the music coverage I had been doing. As important as it is to me document South African youth culture, and its expression through music, it’s all the more gratifying to meet a member of said “youth” that gets what I’m doing, as opposed to an editor or a gallery curator.

Basically, highlights amount to moments that signal to me that I am doing the right thing, or on the right track. I have had a few books featuring my photographs as the cover image… important to me as photos of mine that effectively speak for themselves. I have had a few exhibitions that have received good response, from critics and viewers alike, and these are also important as they give me the impression that the “body of work” that is building up is not all in vain.

Basically, though I have been shooting just shy of ten years, it’s a good feeling that I get to photograph something as seemingly flippant (to some) as music so extensively, and yet still have time and energy and opportunity to focus on broader social issues, such as poverty, development and HIV/AIDS.

Right up there though, is my inclusion as one of the 36 contestants on the Amstel Salute to Success. At the time of taping, I was 28 years old, and it felt like a significant achievement to be recognised as such for my work as a photographer in general (not in any specific field) to be there with, and be interviewed and judged by, a legend like Alf Khumalo.

 

How did you get involved or started with photography? Was there a progression towards documentary or did you know that was what you wanted to do all along?

I initially started by studying as a journalist. I was focussing on Political Science, with aspirations to become the next Shaun Johnson, but found myself spending more and more time with my camera, a requirement for our second year of study at Technikon Pretoria’s Journalism School. It was just before my 20^th birthday that I wound up photographing racial clashes on campus between Sacso protesters and right-wing students. I photographed this extensively over the next few months, and wound up getting photographs published in the Pretoria News, Beeld, Sowetan, The Star, and (I am told by Associated Press), the Cape Times, Cape Argus and the New York Times.

The more I did this, the more I wanted to be a “press photographer”. However, having studied political science, I was interested in the broader back stories and reasoning of whatever I was photographing, and especially as I spent most of my free time over the next few years shooting music, I began to see the importance of documentary as opposed to “bang bang” press photography, and the more I began to appreciate the importance of it, and the opportunity I had to tell the stories I saw as important to me. I grew into it, but given my propensity towards telling the “long version” as opposed to the short one, you could say it was more what I was inclined to.

 

Who are your favourite local and international photographers?

Locally, there are so many. Oddly enough, one photographer really impressing me lately is a young fashion photographer, headed more and more towards shooting music He’s Warren Van Rensburg, the Photo Editor at Stage magazine. He has a really powerful style, and a really unique way of looking at things. It’s nice to see such work, where you wouldn’t usually expect to find such “class”. Also, people like Guy Tillim, Graeme Williams and Paul Weinerg are a great inspiration to me They are all members of South, and I have been lucky enough to sift through work of theirs that some others don’t get to see regularly, and so appreciate the full scope of their skill and storytelling ability. Guy Tillim’s work of late has been a profound inspiration, and there are stories of Graeme’s that have yet to see the light of day, but are such that I find them incredibly moving.

Overseas, there are two that I hold up as my icons, both Magnum photographers… Gilles Peress and Eugene Richards. Richards is an inspiration like no other. It’s significant that both are with Magnum (though I think Richards may be leaving again) as one of their newest members, Simon Wheatley, is really impressing me of late with his music and counter-culture work.

 

Why did you choose documentary photography and not fine art photography, for example?

There are times when my work has been seen as art, and times when I have selected pictures (or indeed, made them to begin with) on the basis of artistic merit rather than standard, straightforward “documentation”; but the term “artist” is one I will always be uncomfortable with, insofar as it can apply to me or my work. However much of myself may come through in my images, I still do not see it as “self-expression”… my primary purpose is to tell a story, someone else’s, and hence documentary, however I choose not to persue it, is of more import to me. Besides, Ansel Adams said you can have a craftsman without art, but you cannot be an artist without craft, so I prefer to concentrate on the craft.

 

What do you love most about photography?

Being succinct. Everyone who knows me knows that I talk too much, am quite possibly extroverted. How I manage to fade into the background as a documentary photographer I do not know, but I love that for all my words, an image can still put across so much, with so “little”. The saying goes that a novelist is a failed short story writer, and a short story writer a failed poet. What I love about photography is that it sometimes, to me, [says] that a poet at times can be a failed photographer. I love the lyricism of it.

 

What are your aims and ambitions for the progression of your career?

I would definitely say, be it a goal or a flight of fancy, that I would one day like to be a member of Magnum. For me, the agency embodies everything (via its members, its history, and its approach) that is important to me about documentary work. I might just make… being a member of South was a similar dream. Here I am. Other than that, while there are book projects and extended projects to be planned on the horizon, I just take it as it comes, and try to consistently build up a body of work that reflects what it is I am trying to do at any given time.

 

Do you have any future plans for your career such as an overseas trip or breaking into the international market?

I wish to keep shooting here as much as possible. Even if I were to try for the international market, it would still be to shoot from here. I love my country, and I am not even close to knowing it well enough. I have no interest in globetrotting photojournalism, as far as my career goes, but I have plans to travel and document through Africa.

 

In your opinion, what is your best project so far?

I couldn’t say. Whatever I am shooting at the time is of utmost import to me. Then, when I step back, I always feel that there is more I want to say. As it is, “Son… Take a Good Look Around” is a project I hope to return to, but my AIDS work is of the most relevant I have ever done, to others at least, and something I hope to secure funding for in the future, to continue with in greater detail.

 

Any tips for aspiring photographers?

Kep shooting. Develop an eye, and read, read, READ. Be it images or text, reading about photography is of immense importance. The more you shove into your mind, the more it forces your mind to react on instinct as you develop your style, as there is too much to process simply. At least that’s the way I see it, and do it.

 

In 2005, Liam Lynch exhibited “Monochroom In Stereo” where he travelled with Afrikaans punk rock band, Fokofpolisiekar, promoting their EP “Monoloog In Stereo” by playing unplugged shows. He also finished a “one night stand” of road images called “End of the Road” which appeared in the cover story of the November issue of Stage magazine.