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christhebarker · 6 years

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Twenty bloody years

Today HR informed me it was my 20th anniversary at my company so in a slightly self-indulgent post here's ten random things from twenty random years. I intended to do twenty but I think it's long enough really.

1 Talent spotting

Standing at the light box looking at transparencies through a loop I spotted a star. It was my first week at Classic FM magazine and that girl was the young Katherine Jenkins making one of her first PR appearances backstage at the classical Brit awards. I demanded to do a cover shoot with her. She was incredibly beautiful and totally charming in real life. Over the three years I worked on that mag I photographed her on numerous occasions , upping the ante every time; borrowing a million dollars worth of diamonds, an Aston Martin DB5 and ultimately a palace for each successive shoot. Over that time I saw her evolve from a little girl, green around the gills into a bona fide diva - never heard her sing though. It was never about that for me. She clearly had star quality.

2 Tunnel vision

I art directed the McLaren in house magazine for a while. It wasn't a comfortable job - the tobacco advertising ban was coming through at the time and the marketing team were all over everything - so it's quite fitting that that my most memorable experience was pretty uncomfortable too. I had an idea for a cover shoot that I'd never seen done before. For the Monaco issue I wanted a front on close up of coulthard in his car heading for the tunnel with it reflected in his visor. Amazingly they allowed me to borrow his MP4-16, overalls and helmet, but not the man himself. So, being fairly small (DC is tiny) it fell to me to be his body double. Those cars are cramped. I sat for an hour in that tiny cockpit, moulded to his girl-like hips and I could barely walk afterwards. And the visibility, Christ they must get claustrophobic in those things. The rear view mirror was about the size of a cigarette lighter. Makes you realise it does take some balls to go at that speed in those things.

3 Olympic vision

It's very rare in any non-performing profession to see people enjoying your work in its natural environment but London 2012 provided me with that, among many other unbelievable, opportunities. I had the chance to witness Mo Farah's historic 5000m win at the London Olympic stadium and see Bolt win gold too to boot. But the take home for me was witnessing 100s of people - in the grounds, in the stadium, on the train home - consuming and enjoying my work on the Official Olympic Daily Programmes. You never get that opportunity in publishing, and to top it off there was also televised praise from John Inverdale and Claire Balding on the BBC. And Lord Heseltine told me it was the best thing we had ever published when he came in to the office. A real morale booster at that point when spirits were starting to flag in the middle of sixteen solid days of 6am-9pm (then a break, then the Paralympics too).

4 The royal wee

Sometimes it's easy to take it for granted. The intimate moments with incredible people. I remember turning to the PR as we were sitting in on a rehearsal by the Ballet Rambert as they were perfecting some superhuman feat I couldn't possibly imagine doing and saying "We've seen some things haven't we" and laughing about it. I've witnessed personal performances for me and a photographer alone from some of the greatest classical musicians alive Julian Lloyd Weber running through Bach's cello concerto in his kitchen, James Galway toddling away at something he was learning, but my favourite anecdote is probably when me and Sting took it in turns to sneak into the Queen's private toilet in the royal opera house for a piss. "Well if you're doing it I'm gonna go as well" he said.

5 Sheffield steel

I accidentally touched Jessica Ennis's backside while adjusting a Union Jack draped around her in a Sheffield steel mill. Which is quite appropriate seeing as they are buns of steel. It was like I'd bashed into a wall, not a person. It was a complete accident and I don't think she noticed but it was quite memorable. Even though at the time I didn't really know who she was, same with Mo a week earlier, who I shot in the world's oldest wind tunnel at the National Physical Laboratory just down the road from my house. No idea who he was at the time. We chatted about a mate he may have worked with at McDonald's I believe.

6 Have I got awards for you

I've been fortunate enough to win a few awards over the years. We won PPA publication of the year for the Olympics work, my most high profile win was BSME art director of the year earlier this year for Work. magazine but my favourite win was the second of my back-to-back cover of the year awards voted for by a room of my peers on the night. Anyone can win something once with a fluke, but to do it twice was pretty special. It means you must know what you're doing. But what made the Brexit cover win extra special for me was that when I went up to receive it I spotted Ian Hislop, a bit of a hero of mine, sitting in the front row giving me a thumbs up. I got to chat to him after in the green room and I told him I thought he was the best thing about Britain today.

7 Trouble in Tuscany

There's been a bit of travel over the years. In the early days we would fly out to Germany to show proofs to BMW and Mercedes. Unimaginable now what with PDFs, emails, Skype and minuscule budgets. I photographed a sprinter in Florida, a hurdler in Ostrava... but the most memorable trip was to photograph tenor Andrea Bocelli at his home just outside Pisa. Memorable because it was such a disaster. As you may know he is blind, and his English isn't brilliant so communication was a problem. And the fact that to ease his obvious discomfort with the whole situation he insisted on using props. He left the room and came back in with a trumpet for example, which he insisted on holding in shot for every frame. Then just as we were getting underway someone started cooking pasta in his kitchen and the smell made him wander off. We didn't know if it was over or if he was coming back. Eventually he did and we got a few extra frames without the trumpet but it was such a bad day that when we left and the photographer put a light stand through the hire car's rear light I was like "yeah, that's about right".

8 High anxiety

Borrowed a helicopter for a shoot once. That was bloody terrifying. Never been in one before. If you've never done it, it's like being in a transit van in the air and whenever they want to turn or move in any way it kind of lurches. You feel like the pilot is only slightly in control and gravity is the real driver. I kept my head down and looked at the pictures as they came in on the laptop, pretending I wasn't there in the end.

9 Roger that

Seeing a genuine sporting legend at the top of his game is incredible. None of the other sporting events I've been present for in a work capacity - Grands Prix, UEFA Cup Finals, England test cricket - quite match up to seeing Roger Federer take on Andy Murray from the front row at the O2. Before the match I'd been looking forward to seeing Murray's trademark smashes but seeing Federer caress the ball and think five strokes ahead from such close quarters converted me to the tennis legend I had previously thought was a bit boring.

10 Mercury prizing

As far as I can tell I was responsible for Gomez winning the Mercury Music Prize in 1998. Which is weird because they were up against Pulp and I love Pulp. I was sitting on a table with the MD of Technics - I think, it's all a bit of a blur to be honest - at the awards ceremony and he was really interested in my opinion on who I thought should win. This was just after Gomez had done a storming rendition of Whipping Piccadilly and I think it probably swayed me. So when he disappeared for a bit then came back and told me he'd put his vote in for my favourite I didn't have the heart to say I'd changed my mind and thought Pulp should win. It was a very close run thing as well apparently. Sorry Jarvis.

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