The MOOD Podcast
In The MOOD Podcast, Matt Jacob, renowned cultural portrait photographer, dives deep into the world of photography and the visual arts, with guests from all around the creative industry, across all parts of the globe, sharing inspiring stories and experiences that will leave you wanting more. With years of experience and a passion for storytelling, Matt has become a master of capturing lesser-told human stories through his photography, and teams up with other special artists from around the world to showcase insights, experiences and opinions within the diverse and sometimes controversial photography world.
You can watch these podcasts on his Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@mattyj_ay.
You can also follow Matt's work on his Instagram @mattyj_ay and his website: https://mattjacobphotography.com.
The MOOD Podcast
What Can We Trust About The Past And Why It Still Shapes Our Work: Kent Andreasen, EP103
Kent Andreasen, a Cape Town-based photographer and filmmaker, joins me to talk about his new photobook Memory Bank (published by Witty Books), which tells the story over a decade shaped by doubt, discipline, and a complicated relationship with memory.
Our chat together moves from South Africa’s creative landscape to therapy, trauma, and to this book that feels like a fever dream stitched into sequence.
We discussed:
- The real story behind the attack that inspired Memory Bank
- How trauma transforms into art
- The tension between truth and memory in photography
- South Africa’s complex creative landscape
- Finding authenticity in commercial work
- How AI is challenging what it means to “see”
- Why photography is still a tool for healing
Order Memory Bank at the Witty Books website here: https://witty-books.com/Memory-Bank-Kent-Andreasen
Follow Kent and his work:
Website: www.kentandreasen.com
Instagram: @kentandreasen
This episode is sponsored by Strata Editions - use discount code MOOD for 10% discount on their store - visit strata-editions.com to shop and see their collections.
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Welcome to the Mood Podcast, uncovering the art of conversation through the lens of photography and creativity one frame at a time. I'm your host, Matt Jacob, and today I am joined by South African photographer Kent Andreten, an artist whose work drifts between the commercial and personal, between sharp precision and quiet introspection. His new book, Memory Bank, published by WittyBooks, feels like this kind of visual mixtape, a decade-long reflection on memory, pain, and the strange comfort of forgetting. Through colour, texture, and restraint, Kent explores the fragments of a life, the things we hold on to, and the ones that fade. In our conversation, we dive into his process of bookmaking and photography, the tension between trust and distrust inherent in photography, and how mental health and doubt can coexist with creative success. Kent opens up about this uneasy relationship between memory and photography, the pain and power of self-critique, and how mental health, travel, and creative isolation have really shaped his work. We talk about color and silence, about the way his distrust can fuel truth, and about building a book that feels like therapy disguised as art. This is Memory Bank, and this is Kent Andreasen on remembering, forgetting, and finding meaning in the space between. Enjoy. All right, Kent Andreerson. Welcome to the Mood Podcast. I'm I'm so happy to have you on here and thanks for um taking the time to speak with me.
SPEAKER_01:Thanks so much for having me. Looking forward to it.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, and I'm looking forward to getting your new book. Now we're here mostly to kind of talk about your new book, Memory Bank, and to kind of dive into the whys, hows, and processes and philosophies behind it, as well as kind of my own interpretations. I don't have a physical copy of the book, but you kindly sent me um the digital version, I guess, uh before this conversation. So I've I've really enjoyed spending time with it. Before we kind of jump into everything, what I thought would be good for us and the audience um to listen to and to watch is just for me to read what you wrote as an outline for this book, if it if it's okay for you, because I think it provides such good context um around the book, but also around you as a person. So if you don't mind, I'll just I'll just read that before we begin.
SPEAKER_01:Go for it. Go for it.
SPEAKER_00:The idea of writing an outline for this book has caused me stress for a long time. If I had wanted to be a writer, it's something I would actively be doing and would probably be broke. Previously, I half-heartedly wrote a piece that I tried to cleverly explain the work I had made, which I now know falls flat. After all, this feels like a thought experiment in many ways. Nonetheless, here I am again as a result of a conversation I had with a friend of mine, Matthew Fremantle. He is a well-known South African poet and writer with a knack for seeing through my facade. I say this because I presented him with the dummy of this book to look over, and he called me for a meeting to discuss his findings. Up until this point, I had shown a few people the work, and most said they enjoyed it, but didn't seem to have really looked at it. And I mean really looked at it. I was really eager to hear what he said because I respect his opinion and knew he wouldn't hold back. We started chatting and he revealed that the book he had uh he revealed that the book had a certain darkness and pain that he wasn't expecting. And he was the second person who had said this. I found myself at a review in Montana a few weeks prior to this interaction, and Jenya Friedland expressed the same notion that the book was laced with people in pain. And this got me thinking, maybe that is what this is about. My own internal struggle with myself and my attempt to resolve aspects of work through memory, my life in South Africa, and these frameworks that I create for myself. Matthew also said he doesn't normally advise artists to write about their own work, but knew that the work was so personal that there may not be someone equipped to pull back the veil. At the end of the day, each image makes sense to me and is more about figuring things out than making something cohesive. A trail of consciousness that comes at you like a fever dream and hopefully only lets up when you get to the end. I often didn't enjoy making this work because it felt so self-absorbed, but now that it's done, I see that it was necessary. Really super interesting. We're gonna kind of break down some of that. Um, I know it might be uncomfortable for you to listen to, but I think it was really um an interesting excerpt that you you sent me. And there's a few other things that I know you you've said before about this work as well as your own. And something that did kind of reach out to me was I think you said photography is a vessel that you use to come to terms with your own reality, which kind of backs up everything that I just read. Give me an insight as to kind of what that reality is that you're trying to come to terms with and where this book fits in with that.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, it's an interesting notion because I think living in South Africa, there's a strong tradition of photography that that kind of paints a certain light, I think, with South Africans like South Africa's past and and apartheid, there's a certain sort of documentary school of thinking and in terms of the work that's being made out of here, um, which is incredibly interesting, but it's something that I think because of my age, being born in '91, um, and sort of being at the back end of the sort of apartheid years, I never really experienced any of that. So I don't have that as a sort of a grounding point. Um, and I think because I've been fortunate enough to to travel so much and and my work's taken me throughout Africa and and overseas, I've kind of always looked outwardly towards like European and American photographers, and then applied those ethos to my own work back in South Africa. So I think for me, the way that like my work is shaped is shaped by something that isn't South African. Um so yeah, it's it's it's a it's a tough thing to to to also be a a white South African photographer, uh, a male white South African photographer, and and uh finding your sort of niche and your place, um, with what also not like trading on other people's toes and the complexities of South African politics makes it hard to kind of make work that feels meaningful but sort of honest to your own reality. And I think memory bank in many ways and the work that I made in that sort of body of work is it kind of created sort of accountability, but also allowed myself like this flexibility to create work that I felt was important to me. So yeah, it's been an interesting journey in that regard. Um I don't know if that answers your question, but yeah, my real my my I guess my reality is complex because I also I went to an incredible school. I was very come from a middle class family, um, upper middle class. Um yeah, I've had a very good upbringing. So finding sort of the stories that you want to tell and the narratives that you want to kind of bring to light is is something that takes a lot of thought. Um, because you can be quickly found out to be quite dishonest and and kind of surface level if if you don't uh choose the right thing. So yeah, that's kind of what Memory Bank a lot is about, is actually trying to figure that out. What are the stories that I actually want to tell about myself and then about the world that I kind of live in and the perceived world that I live in.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, sorry to cut away and interrupt, but I did want to mention the current sponsor of the show. And it's not often we have sponsors on the Mood Podcast, but I really did want to connect with this project and feature them as much as possible where I could. They are Strata Editions, which is an experimental photography project and store in Livingston, Montana, in the US, whom I had the luxury to visit when I was passing through a while back on a photography project, and I was blown away. They are primarily a photo book store and exhibition gallery space, presenting collections of photo books, photographic art, and furniture, all designed in-house. By focusing on visual and material work through a thematic lens, they offer a space to consider the relationships between photography, self, environment, and production. The works they share tell stories about themselves as well as how they tell the stories that matter to them. Physically, Strata Edition serves as a reading room, workshop, and exhibition space for anyone who passes through its doors. Online, their e-commerce game in the photo book world is legit, and some of the books in their collections are not even readily available for purchase anywhere else. They're either sold out or out of print or imported. The titles they offer have been made available directly by the publishers or the artists themselves, and their hope is that you'll want to share these books with friends and family and add them to your own library. And I highly recommend you do. I have a few of my own favorite books from these guys. I love them. They offer artist exhibitions and shows consistently also throughout the year, and continue in their own reflections on the relationship between people and environment in this region. So go check them out. They're great guys, excellent platform. Shoot them a follow. Use the discount code in the description to grab a 10% discount on your order. Do be mindful though, they do only ship inside the US at this stage. All right, back to the episode. And so where did the self-absorption come? I mean, every photographer, I guess, battles with that because it's it you're almost telling the world to look at you and, you know, take note. This is this is me and my my art, right? So there's there's always an element of that and a little bit of embarrassment, you know, like what where did the kind of in that first thing that I read out, you said you almost didn't enjoy the work because it kind of felt self-absorbent. How did you well, why didn't you necessarily enjoy the work? And is it more of kind of a retrospective enjoyment now that it's complete?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, like I was saying earlier, I think there's a lot of sort of pressure, I think, in South Africa to be telling these very in-depth stories about the world that we surround in terms of poverty, um, the climate of South Africa in terms of its like social landscape. Um, it feels like a lot of that work is the stuff that's also getting very seen and is in galleries and and has the as has the sort of full tradition, as it were. So to make a more sort of abstract body of work like this felt like I was kind of turning my back on that a bit. Um, and it felt very close to like self-portraits in many ways, which personally, when I look at self-portraits, I kind of cringe. So um, yeah, it was like kind of figuring that out, but also like this this constant worry, I think, that I have of people understanding the work, and that's kind of what that write-up kind of tries to get across, is that it makes sense to me, and it's meant to feel like almost a fever dream. Whether it makes sense to other people, like only time will tell when it when the book comes out and people kind of page through it, but um it all kind of pieces together in a way that I feel is very cohesive. But through my sort of interactions, people like Matt and and various people at the Chico Review, for example, for example, and Montana and other people I've shown, it's trying to piece those sort of narratives together in a in a very abstract way that still has the feeling that I want to get across of this, like as I said, um fever dream. But um yeah, so that yeah, it's that constant, it's like a it's a it's just a balancing act, really that I was trying to navigate.
SPEAKER_00:Sounds like you're almost uncomfortable with or have been uncomfortable with putting this work out there within the South African photography climate. Was that kind of a natural progression for you to look abroad in terms of where a suitable market might be for your work? If I mean not saying South Africa isn't, but if most of the this the success comes from the kind of documentary and the the those types of politically charged narratives, then did you feel like you were being pulled elsewhere in that respect?
SPEAKER_01:Um, yes and no. I think I've always kind of tried to see my work as like an internationally um established um or gone down a sort of pathway that that leads toward a like sort of more international outlook on things, because it's no secret that if you do well overseas as a South African artist, whether it be photography or the various other sort of um practices, that often you get way better received when when when you kind of come back to South Africa. So that was kind of my thinking. I mean, the the sort of publishing landscape here for photography um is is incredibly tough and almost non-existent, and there's almost like no no people doing um actual printing of books. It's it's a very much a dying art here. So that was more, it was more like a a practical sort of um sort of outlook at things, and then also just wanting the book to live in a landscape that felt like it it could live outside of Africa, I mean South Africa, Africa, and then and and more on a global stage and appear at play places like Paris Photo, which I'm sure we'll talk about later. So that was my sort of thinking. I I like to like kind of start uh start outward and then kind of move back towards South Africa and and hopefully you'll get kind of well received here, whether it be now or in years to come. So that's kind of my thinking.
SPEAKER_00:Cool. And and just before we kind of move move deeper into it, give us an idea of your background and how you got into photography, why photography is a medium, et cetera, et cetera.
SPEAKER_01:So um, yeah, I grew up in the leafy suburbs of Cape Town in the southern commonly known as the southern suburbs in a in an area called Newlands. Um, my parents are both very hard-working individuals, both had their own sort of or had a had a company of their own, so kind of learned that from a young age in turn in terms of like an entrepreneurial spirit. Um, I went to a very traditional all-boys school called um the South African College School, which is the oldest school in the in the country. Um got an amazing education there, but it it did come with its complexities. I mean, it's very driven by sport and sort of this very sort of masculine outlook on things, which which took me a long while to kind of unlearn once I left school, um, which I'm thankful I did. And I went down that journey of like kind of unpacking that um in my 20s and into my 30s. Um yeah, and then I I started photography quite late. I mean, I I think I was 18 when I started photography um on a on a family trip. Kind of we went away um on a sort of what what people call a safari, I guess we call it just going to the bush. But um yeah, just started taking photos there and it kind of bit. I I have an incredibly, I wouldn't say addictive personality, but I get really full on into things, and and photography is one of those things that really grabbed me from the beginning and and hasn't let me go. So um, yeah, and then I was I my girlfriend at the time went and studied photography, and and she was kind of relaying back to me that it wasn't something that she would recommend. I was I it was around 2010, I I was just out of school and I I went and lived in China, and she she was back in South Africa studying um photography, and I was in China and kind of developing my my eye as it were, and I found being in China as a quite a lonely space, it was such an amazing place to make photographs because I spent hours just walking around. Um then I returned to South Africa after that trip of that year of being away and um decided I would go and study um cinematography and directing at a at a local film school here called After, which was a three-year degree. So I got a degree in Motion Picture. And during that time, I was kind of building my portfolio and and was fortunate enough to have friends in the sort of music scene here and a little bit in sort of advertising and commercial work. And I was already working while I was at in in college, which was amazing because it kind of built a sort of vocabulary of how things worked in that in that world. Um, and I quite early I felt like I recognized that yes, I want to be a sort of art photographer, as it were, and I would love to make books and be in galleries and so on and so forth. But I I also love the sort of challenge of commercial photography and how I can kind of apply my practice, which I see as kind of adjacent to that, to these kind of commercial worlds. Um, so that kind of developed, and then um when I when I left college, um I was very lucky to then sign with a local agency here that represented me and uh things kind of kicked off with from there, and I I was I was lucky to land quite a sizable campaign um for a commercial client, which which allowed me some sort of capital to um then do a trip to the states as well as um Europe, and I s I signed with an uh an agent in Italy called 2DM. And yeah, then things kind of grew from there and and uh spent quite a long time kind of just building the commercial side of things, um, and then slowly realized that I couldn't do that forever, and started then making a lot more personal work and and developing concepts like like memory bank and some of the other stuff that I've been doing.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, it's you definitely have one of the longer commercial and editorial work experience that I've seen in terms of your CV. So that you've been you've been really successful in that side of things and and busy uh in your 20s, I guess, just going out there and hustling. Has that relative success in the edit? I mean, you've worked with um, you know, people like not not people, brands like Nike, Vogue, Google, etc. You, you know, you've got some big names under your belt. Um, has that type of experience changed your relationship with photography, or or did it what type of influence did it have on your personal work, if if any, certainly when it comes to memory bank?
SPEAKER_01:It's a it's an interesting question. And and I think um, firstly, thank you for for noticing that. Um I have been very fortunate in that regard. I think also geographically, I I I was able to get a lot of that work because of where I'm based. Um, but um I I like to think that it hasn't shaped how I make my personal work, but then I show people work and they immediately go, Do you work in the commercial sphere? So it obviously does. Uh I think I'm so entrenched in it that it's hard for me to recognize that. But um it definitely has. I mean, I think it's more just being disciplined, I think. Um, and it's something we can talk about if you'd like and let um as we go on. But I for a lot of my projects, I set up these lists, especially for memory bank. I had all these ideas floating around in my head of how I want to kind of tackle this. Um, and I built these lists that I would then tick off week by week. And when I wasn't working commercially, I was doing this work and ticking these lists off as I went. So I think it's more the discipline, and then also being able to shoot as much as you do commercially and kind of building the sort of technical know-how in terms of lighting exposure, like uh, in my opinion, like scanning, even scanning of my negatives has almost become like an art form in itself. Uh the amount of time I've spent behind my scanner because of because of COVID. During COVID, I scanned my entire archive, so I have it like on file, and that sort of time in the saddle, as it were, has really developed a sort of eye and understanding of how I want the colours to look out of my film. Um, and almost created like a signature, I feel, of of how the colors are kind of perceived. So yeah, uh I think it all feeds into each other, and I'm and I'm very thankful for it for having both, because it affords me to kind of do both at the same time, and and the personal work kind of breeds a sort of uniqueness and and sort of niche into the commercial stuff, and vice versa. It kind of the the commercial work allows me to fund a lot of the the personal work and and allows me to travel and that sort of thing. So I'll always continue to do both, I think. Um no matter what happens. I mean, I would love to pursue the art side of things a lot more, but it is what it is.
SPEAKER_00:Not enough money in it, not enough, not enough funds.
SPEAKER_01:Exactly.
SPEAKER_00:Well, maybe there is if you're you're top top of the tree, if you're an Alexoth, maybe, but um, yeah. Tell tell me about these lists. I mean, I totally agree with you. Um, I haven't done too much commercial work. I've I've been uh privileged myself to to not have to necessarily, um, but I can definitely understand the the lessons you learn from a discipline side of things and that you can bring into your photographic practice. Interesting, like you're talking about lists. Are you talking about lists in terms of um photographic setups or locations or idea concepts in terms of what you want to because I I look at your work and I think certainly with memory bank, I don't see too much that's contrived. Maybe it is, but it feels a little bit more from shooting from the hip than maybe some of your commercial work. Am I right or wrong in that?
SPEAKER_01:Well, that was my that was the goal, is like creating a perception that it was all shot from the hip. Um, and that's where those lists kind of come in. I spent a lot of time when I'm sitting on an aeroplane, for example. I I seem to have all the ideas in the world when I'm sitting on an aeroplane and can't really do much about anything. Um so I spend time compiling these lists, and they don't come down to say um talking about lighting setups or time of day. That comes later, but it's just simple, often very shorthand, like this wall with this concept, this idea, and I have them sitting in my studio at my desk. I look at it every day. I'm working on another book project that I'm that I'm actually almost done with, and it sits and looks at me every day. And I think as an artist, I don't want to be an artist that talks about all the work that I want to do. It's I want to just be actively pursuing it, whether it be shooting 10 shots in a week or shooting once a month, at least like you're chipping away. Um and I think that comes from sort of my family background and just like this notion of like kind of like you got to get things going if you if you want to sort of see the fruits of your labor. You can't just talk about it, talks cheap. So yeah, that's kind of how I approach things. It's kind of a very sort of regimented way of working, and sometimes the lists get neglected, life happens, and I look up and I haven't I haven't shot for like two months, and it's frustrating, but I know it's there and I know that it's getting getting tackled. So that's kind of where the lists kind of come in. Um, and memory bank is like, as I said, it's in many ways it's a culmination of all these things happening behind the scenes that then hopefully make the image kind of look like it's it just kind of happened. So there's a lot of a lot of that, which is I'm glad that it feels that way. That's how it's meant to feel.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, cool. And we're I'm gonna touch upon uh the the sequencing and the this uh the nature of the cohesion with the images is later. But as as I want to kind of now go into the book a little in a little bit more detail, before I do, I'm gonna read you one more excerpt that I found very, very interesting again. And I'm not sure if you you you'll be able to tell me after I read it, whether you wrote this before or after the write-up that you sent me, but I'll read it first, and I have many questions that kind of emanate from this. So Memory Bank is the study of my thoughts, both past and present. It investigates the relationship I have with myself and often with the act of photography. The work even goes as far as exploring various devices used to capture images, both artistically and practically. The focus of the imagery is my constant frustration with the medium of photography. The contrast between spending time at home versus being on the road for work, immediate homesickness, past relationships, heartbreak, traumas, family, mental health, illness, and the repetitive failings of my memory. What can we trust of what has passed and how helpful is it to our present and ultimately future selves? This distrust is the starting point for the work and has allowed me to explore these themes with a flexibility that I haven't allowed myself before. With this blank slate, I can draw from my archive, recreate scenes from my life, explore collaborations with fellow artists, and even draw inspiration from my dreams. I hope that this becomes my new standard practice moving forward. So the the the line in there that was really interesting for me was what can we trust of what has passed and how helpful is it to our present and ultimately future selves? So you tell me what how A, when was that? When did you write that? Because I know the the work in Memory Bank is over a few years, right? But when did you write that and has it changed since in terms of this trust and distrust of what has passed, what's real, what's fiction, and and looking back on that now?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, so that was written before the the writing that I have now. And I even had a buddy of mine who's a very talented writer, um, also draw up a sort of an introduction to the book, which also didn't work, unfortunately. So it's been a it's been a journey, let's put let's put it that way. But I think that writer, a lot of it is true, and I I think it's it's a lot of how I perceive this sort of body of work, but I I also feel like there's a sense that I have all the answers in that write-up, like it it or how I how I hear it. It's like it's it's got this finality to it, and that's not really how I feel about the work. I'm still figuring out the work, I'm still practicing as a photographer. If I had the answers, then then I wouldn't have much to draw from. So I think yeah, that that write-up kind of falls flat in that regard. Um but I still have a distrust in the whole medium. I think I think I have a lot of um sort of not distrust, but I I would love to be more of a mixed media, medium sort of artist. I would love to be doing some painting, I would love to be integrating writing into my into my work more, not necessarily me doing the writing, but having a sort of more collaborative outlook on things, which which I which I am working on a lot more. Um and also just bringing photography and the practice of like objects and archive into like a three-dimensional space is something that I'm more and more sort of interested in. Um people like Tarren Simon and and Bruomberg and Shannon who have now have now split. Like that sort of work works under the sort of blanket of photography, but also pushes completely out of it. And I think that for me is is really exciting, and it's something that I want to pursue more and more. Um this new body of work that I'm working on has explorations of like printmaking and and that sort of thing outside of photography using ink and even some AI, and yeah, like just playing with what it means to be someone that's very visual and and thinking about that. So when I say distrust in photography, that's kind of what I mean. It's not whether if I take your photograph of a battle scene as true or not true. It's like I'm not interested in those discussions because I think inherently in its nature it's hard to in any medium cover what is true because it's all about perspectives I guess so that's kind of what I mean in that passage of of like that distrust um and then talking about memory it's just I it's such a cliche I feel but a photographer having a bad memory it's just it's just one of those things and I something that I I really struggle with. So that was kind of the starting point and I can elaborate if you like about the whole memory thing but I'll let you ask ask maybe more questions and we can kind of get into that as we go.
SPEAKER_00:Tell me about the memory thing um does that whether you're because you you mentioned also in that that uh pre-write up I guess this constant frustration with the medium photography does that is that what you mean in terms of like the distrust as well that kind of got goes in into it or is there something else that provides this frustration that you you get from photography? Because we all feel it we all feel that like this tangible frustration just why can't I get the shot that I want or why can't I make sense of this work or why can't I get success or whatever it might be. But do you mean something a little bit more philosophical?
SPEAKER_01:If I'm honest I think a lot of the frustration I'm also hiding behind there is my frustration with writing about photography. I think writing about photography is something that I really don't feel comfortable about. Like as I said if I wanted to be a writer it's something I would have pursued and that's why I always try and like pass the buck and try to get writers to write about my work but sometimes that's tough to do. So that's maybe also I'm kind of shielding myself with the use of frustration about photography but maybe it's also like a shield about not wanting to talk about the work in terms of exactly how I perceive it in my head because it's maybe not it's not possible for me me to kind of outline it in a way that I feel is like neat and tidy and like ticks all the boxes and and and that's kind of why I ended on the write up that I did because it's like it's like a surrender of like I actually don't have all the answers but kind of read into this as you must and and hopefully draw something from it that you like dislike or anything other yeah anything else I mean yeah the works made I mean that was the hard part now people just need to hopefully just engage with it.
SPEAKER_00:So yeah just articulating um every time I go to critique or vice versa um it's just articulating this kind of like cliched elevator pitch right with a with this this whatever you're presenting is really difficult um because you know in your head or you can maybe you don't know and you kind of want to feel out maybe some people can help you articulate it's really difficult. You know we that's not what we want to do. It's like doing the business side of photography. It's like I don't want to do that. I just want to do the work and I want it to speak for itself but unfortunately we don't live in a world of mono um you know kind of expressions of a certain medium is it's multi-medium multifaceted medium world. So um let's give me speaking of elevated pictures um just give me your idea a very short um synopsis of the book in your own mind and I know you you kind of want to let the audience and let people make of it what they want to and we've touched upon it a little bit but give give me give me what this book means to you and what your intent with it is.
SPEAKER_01:Now that it's finished and I mean it went to print on Friday um it feels just like a journey like a a journey of self-discovery uh using a book as therapy in many ways um within my personal life but both but in my sort of practice as well that's a shortest sort of outline of this it's a the images are just like a byproduct of me kind of delving into ways in which I want to make work trying things that I wouldn't necessarily try otherwise and and kind of coming to terms with a sort of accountability in my work that I I think I've sidestepped a lot previously and I tried these sort of half-parted approaches towards projects this one I threw myself fully into it and and yeah came up with a a lot of a lot of images um that seem all over the place but um through this sort of um wading through the sort of bull rushes I've come to somewhat of a cohesive um thought experiment experiment slash fever dream so yeah it's really hard you have to see it to kind of figure it out but uh that's kind of how I would describe it which is not a very good description but it is what it is.
SPEAKER_00:Well I I cheated I read your write up before I I went through all of the images so it kind of gave me a little bit of context but the the word I wrote was like a a mixtape like a visual mixtape of what's in your on your in your mind and then fever dream kind of the this memory aspect comes into it as well as like these little like snippets of your memory but you can't quite grab onto them. It's like when you wake up from a dream you're like what was what was that dream? It was all over the place but I can't really like you know what I mean and it had this real unsettling feeling to it but this beautiful um emotive kind of cohesion that they kind of felt by the time we got to the end I was like okay uh I need to look through these again but it's starting to make sense to me because initially and like you said as well it initially when I first looked through them it did feel quite scattered. And then your use of colour and black and white as well as the different types of lighting and what you're trying to say and then I go through it again like every photo makes sense in the right place. And there's some beautiful sequences that you've put together that just kind of took took me another look that's because I'm pretty slow but it definitely made sense and I love that to it I love this layered approach where it's like you just drive so much curiosity in the viewer and this this story that you're taking people through it feels disjointed but it's not it's this this melee of of what's going on in your mind and these these struggles that you've had personally which I presume are the ones that you kind of mentioned in your write-up in terms of homesickness and some mental health issues and loneliness and travel and all that kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah and I mean getting onto the sort of memory aspect of things like we discussed earlier and something that I want to touch on it's like this whole book started from about 10, 11 years ago I got attacked on a commercial shoot um in South Africa and I didn't ever want to bring that up in terms of the write up and discussing it in terms of in the in sort of formal space because there's enough of that that comes out of South Africa and like sort of work born out of violence. But it for me that day is so important because it's not about the actual occurrence of what happened it's more how the the day in my mind has kind of shifted and warped and how at the time I for the most part didn't find it quite significant to be honest. It happened I was injured my camera got stolen it was incredibly traumatic but at the time it didn't feel traumatic and then how these memories and the the occurrence of this manifested down the line and how that day has changed in my head and in later years realized that I behave in certain ways in certain situations is because of certain events like that and other things that have happened in my in my past. So that's what interests me interests me about memory is just like this um we cling on to memory as it as if it's our own but it's actually a collective it's like a communal thing that happens to us like it's your parents telling you about when you were four years old that this is what you do and you hang on to that and then you have your own memory of that and then your cousin tells you another memory that's of that time and it contradicts that. So memory is very is something that I don't hold on to too dearly and maybe that's why I have a bad memory because it's so easily warped and changed and there's studies on that when when people talk about very traumatic events that happen in the world things like 9-11 for example I think it it actually is called the Mandela effect ironically but where you you you perceive certain memories of a day as one thing and then they actually proven to be completely wrong. So it's very interesting and I and I think that's what a lot of this work's about um there's a very sort of distinctive shot of a gun in in in the book that's on the cover. That's in selling that as a print as well right yeah as a print um um that that picture is so interesting to me because for me it tells everything you need to know about the book in one image in terms of me explaining it now is is that for the longest time I thought that gun belonged to my uncle who took his own life using that weapon. I then confronted my dad about not confronted but had a discussion with my dad about the gun and it just turned out that that gun was a gun that he inherited from his from his father and they weren't linked at all. But as a young child I had put these memories together and created the scene in my head that was completely untrue. So that's kind of what a lot of the books kind of playing on is um and then you look at that that the the Ziploc bag or the sort of vacuum sealed bag in that image is is kind of imitating a sort of evidence bag and the flowers are meant to kind of speak of forgiveness. So it's like thinking of metaphors within some images that are rarely staged like that. That's something that I created through thinking about these ideas and then other images that are like you said are on the fly and kind of happened kind of organically. So there's playing with these ideas of memory and pain and homesickness and as we all do just trying to figure things out I guess so so yeah.
SPEAKER_00:I love it I love hearing that story I don't love kind of the events that you you went through with with um you know referencing that those memories with your images but that it it makes those images now even more interesting.
SPEAKER_01:Is there any uh of your memory that you blocked out that you can't remember from from childhood onwards I don't think voluntarily I just think it's just like I I have this really like a memory like a sieve so it's not it's not voluntary maybe it is but I as I said I had a very amazing upbringing a really happy childhood. So but I definitely do think I struggle with certain mental health issues like depression and and sort of like ups and very sort of severe ups and downs and that sort of thing. So that might also be part of sort of memory loss is just like this continuous like trauma struggle where your your brain's kind of just like in survival mode. So um so yeah and I mean I'm I I'm not shy to talk about the fact that I've been going to therapy and and kind of unpacking that which I think's been really incredible for my work as well. So yeah I I I think talking about mental health in in in sort of all facets of life is really important no matter sort of one circumstance because I'm sure from the outside my career and like as you pointed out like my commercial career looks like this major success but it we all have these ups and downs and and struggles and I think it's important to kind of discuss that within our work but also just as it within a personal sort of aspect and kind of dealing with that before we we get into making these sort of existential bodies of work. I think it's quite important to kind of get to the core of why you're behaving in a certain way. So so yeah it's been an interesting journey so far.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah I think um there's a lot there I want to kind of double click on but I I read a quote from Robert Adams not so long ago about um you know creating real really powerful and beautiful art is only possible if you truly know yourself. And I think there's a lot to be said in that there's there's a lot of facade out there. There's a lot of creating for maybe what you think other people want to see and it's really really difficult to be that vulnerable and be open enough with yourself let alone with other people to be able to create from a place of true honesty and authenticity but in order to do that you've really got to like understand yourself. So kudos to you for for getting therapy and and being able to talk about these things um we can be the most successful I know many many classically defined successful people that are are are extreme depressives and um that you know that they they there's no causation there may be some correlation but I I think it's important to understand the power of that within one's work so you know do you see do you see that as like um you know some because I've I've had my own issues and I I figured like when I got a little bit better would the creative side of me be less good you know do you do we need a little bit of strife and a little bit of struggle a little bit of starving artist mindset to create like powerful work which obviously not true but did you ever have that in you as well like oh well I'm going through something difficult and now I can kind of use photography to express that I think I think we've been sort of um hypnotized in some way by like a sort of like Keith Richards sort of rock and roll um media frenzy just like this hype that you need to be this like wild person that does all this crazy stuff and like you need to be involved with drugs and alcohol and you have to be doing this and hanging out with these certain type of people and and that people are born creative and all of this it's just like for me as I I'm slowly realizing and I mean it's different for everyone but I feel like for me that's all complete nonsense um I've also been sober now for almost five years and my work's never been better.
SPEAKER_01:You know being able to get up early in the morning and not have a hangover and not have the sort of demons of the night before and be able to sit and look at the lists on my wall and not feel a sense of dread because I've I'm like um have all of this stuff going in my head like has been incredibly beneficial. So I don't know like trying to be the best version of yourself whatever that looks like if it means going and drinking 15 beers a night then then that's your thing. But like in my opinion being healthy and and getting into the ocean and doing exercise and trying to be better in your relationships like it's only going to be good for making work because those are the things that are like truly make you a human being and like and we always like I I think it inherently being a creative allows you to be a certain type of way and I don't think you need to kind of pile that up with like exterior factors. It's like your personality and way of thinking so yeah I I don't buy into that hole I I think there's a little bit to be said about like starving artists maybe in terms of like I always think if I had millions of dollars like would I still be keen to go and like hang out in a small town in South Africa and make images but I'm also saying I don't think you need to like if you can eradicate all the the the variables in your life that make your life harder that are easily like dealt with by like going and talking to a friend or a therapist or getting off drugs and alcohol or going and exercising or whatever it may be if that yeah it's just there's a way to kind of make your life better with without feeling like you have to be a certain way as an artist I think that's complete nonsense.
SPEAKER_00:I feel like there's still a cool or not cool mentality with the art world. It's like are you cool enough? Like do you fit the bill in terms of whether it's your you know your outward appearance or whether it's kind of like who you hang around with or it's your music there's definitely still you know maybe it's slightly the slightly younger generation um but I definitely feel that and that can still pull people in the wrong directions right but you know I obviously I totally agree with you. I think one thing I've learned through being as healthy as possible I still have my demons with sugar and um well basically sugar. Yeah but um what when I have a I don't drink nearly as much as I used to and I just think like having clarity of feeling you know I think we're trying to create things to evoke some kind of emotions and feeling not in ourselves as much as other people right and just to understand and to be able to articulate in our own brains like what that feeling is and why and you know really ask those deeper questions. Or bad habits whatever it might be so I think there's there's a lot to be said for that. But um tell tell me I want to get more a little bit into the the the the book production and I mean you called memory bank a a fever dream like a trail of consciousness I think I I read that you you said which is such an awesome phrase so how did you if if it's got this kind of like fever dreamness if that's a word um kind of approach and concept to the book where do you even start with what to leave in what to to what belongs and what didn't was this you and the publisher going through all this and just tell me about the whole kind of curation and sequencing process with the the concept that you have with the book?
SPEAKER_01:It's a very good question because I initially wanted this be to be like an ex super extensive body of work because I wanted it to feel like an assault almost on on sort of like back to back pages of just like really thought out imagery that like you think it's gonna stop and just carries on like getting to you. So I actually took a massive dummy to um Chica review and showed it to a whole bunch of people there and with my fellow attendees as well as the people that I that I kind of met there the sort of the the experts um and they all said the same thing like you need to distill this down like people are gonna just it's like you're gonna fatigue people. And it's something I really took on because that's something also that I I think in the older I get like it's something that I'm I'm trying to be better at is just like sort of eating humble pie and and feeling like I don't know I don't have all the answers and like I I do get things wrong. And giving a person a book that extensive is is almost unfair on the viewer. So I I really took that on um and it's obviously hard because a lot of your pictures feel like your babies and the images that I feel are strong other people are just like this doesn't work as a thing. So to the credit of Tommaso at Witty Books who we can discuss as well they're based out of Italy. He was like send me all the images um I'm gonna work through things and I'm gonna present them to you and then we can kind of take it from there. So we did that and I think there were I think up to eight reviews that we went back and forth which is a lot because I I feel like I'm quite decisive in in terms of my approach to things which obviously doesn't seem that way with such a a long body of work but um he was really incredible in that he like took on my notes and pushed back where he felt um felt it needed and we've kind of settled on on 200 pages which is which is still a lot but the the amount of images that have been cut from that is is a lot so yeah I'm I'm really happy with where it's at and I don't think I would have got there if it wasn't for him being quite hard on on the process and you kind of need that sometimes you need that collaboration and it's been a massive massive learning curve for me because um yeah you can get caught up in your own process and then you can become your worst enemy.
SPEAKER_00:So yeah it's been good tell us more about witty books and it's um yeah I'll I I'll let you talk about them a little bit but also your practice of or the the the approach to finding a publisher and how that all transpired.
SPEAKER_01:And I think this work is so personal it kind of needed that personal touch and like a sort of one-on-one care. Um I think a lot of my other bodies of work maybe could you could I could work with another publisher that's more kind of focused on the sort of maybe the aesthetics of it or just like kind of how many books are we going to sell or how many shops are we going to get it into or so on and so forth. But Tomaso felt very sort of personal and he felt like he took it on as much as I did. So that that's kind of was my thinking and um he was also just really responsive to the work when I sent it to him and he and there was a sort of what stood out to me he was more concerned about talking about the work than like the sort of practicality of publishing a book or like how much money can you give me up front so on and so forth. So there was like a belief in the work before the actual sort of uh practicality of things which I really appreciated um and that's kind of why I think we work so well on on this and and I'm hoping that we can we can do some more work down the line because yeah it's been a uh an amazing process. And why so why now the book I mean you obviously had so many images but then was there a seminal moment where you thought okay right I need to I want to publish some of this and I want to make a book and what was that and why what I've also learned with publishing is you kind of it happens when it happens there's no like I would be lying if it was like I'm making a decision that I want to release this at at Paris photo on these dates and like it's been super seamless and it's taken a while to to find a publisher and it's taken us a while to kind of get the book to where we're happy with it and and then get the right cover design and back and forth with that and a difference of opinion on that. And I don't think that'd be a a good partnership if that was the case. So it's certainly not a it's not a conscious decision. And he's just been like these dates work. He goes to a lot of fairs and he's like I think Paris will be very good for this and I think this is a good my timeline in terms of doing pre-orders and all the logistics around it. So that's kind of why it's coming out now. It's just been a case of us being patient and and crossing our T's and darting our I's as it were to make sure that the book is in a place that it's as good as it's going to get um and get it to the right audience and give it the best chance to kind of get out of the world. So that's kind of our thinking behind it. And he might have other sort of um things to add to that but yeah that's kind of my sort of perspective on things.
SPEAKER_00:Well great timing with Paris Photo which at the time of recording it's gonna be what I mean in about four weeks time. So you you're planning to uh to launch the book uh pre-launch now and then launch the book at Paris yeah exactly and I'm gonna go out there for a few days um I've got a book signing on the 16th um so yeah it should be good uh just get out there meet a whole bunch of people and and just hopefully just immerse myself in in three days of photography and head back to Sunny cave town afterwards so yeah it should be good nice yeah I wish I was going at the moment I can't go but for anything changes I'll see you there what is the um so you you mentioned you're you're working on another body of work um you know we always have projects going on I guess and you know we don't want you to necessarily tell tell us about that if you don't want to but what does kind of that creative recovery look like for you now after because you're obviously focusing on memory bank and the release and then what does that transition look like and what what does the future hold for you in that respect there's no real transition because I kind of work on projects um in parallel all the time so I'll have like three or four or five projects going at the same time and it's just kind of like I said when I have time outside commercial work or sort of like seasonal stuff in terms of areas that I want to document so on and so forth.
SPEAKER_01:So there's a whole bunch of parameters that I work in. So there's no it's not like I'm like taking a break from photography now that memory bank's out and then we'll pick it up just other projects on the go. It's called left out and in many ways and this is something that I'm really kind of focused on in terms of my work is that every body of work that I make moving forward and every book kind of meshes into each other. Whether it be like a design element on the front of the book or a geographical place or like potentially like I memory bank for example in that story I told you about the gun um I want to make a short film about my cousin and his sort of recollection of that tragic incident with his father as a kind of abstract short story of how I perceived that day and his also version of it kind of urging. So that's kind of how it works. So this new body of work as I said left out is very list based again and it's all the work that I've been meaning to do in South Africa for the last say 10 years that I haven't got to and I'm sure we all have a draw of lists that we've been wanting to get to and we never have and I was just like I'm tired of this so I wrote all of them down um project that I was either like maybe they'll become something in the future or I'm never going to get to this. It's just it's a silly idea or it logistically doesn't make sense or whatever. Maybe um I'm just gonna touch on it and I'm gonna kind of let it go. And it's once again a form of therapy in many ways of like I'm gonna get to these projects but I'm not gonna do it. I'm not gonna dive in like a memory back. So it's a whole bunch of images kind of yeah just giving like a nod to these these projects I'm never going to get to um and that's why it's called left out it's like all the stuff that I haven't paid attention to.
SPEAKER_00:And I've got what probably like five what's underpinning what concept is underpinning it other than just stuff you left out but is there a is there a more personal take no I don't think so I think it's just this frustration
SPEAKER_01:Of like, why do we like not be able to get to things like we should not you know we can we can we can s we can sit on Instagram for an hour a day or we can yeah just be really interested into yeah be interested in complete nonsense and we have all these excuses of why we haven't got to this work so this is kind of me like also once again trying to just find myself accountable and make something from it. Um so it'll be a very visual book and it won't have too much text and I'm thinking about kind of doing it in a way that feels even more like a diary than memory bank and playing a little bit with the with the layout and as I said there's some there's a painting, there's gonna be a sculpture, there's some printmaking, there is some like sort of woodwork sort of stuff, and I hope to make it a book and an exhibition at some point. Um yeah, and kind of my sort of introduction into the mixed media world.
SPEAKER_00:So that's kind of well, I was gonna say like some of your images uh in memory bank are images of drawings or images of um you wouldn't put them as like class classical photos, right? I can't you can't describe the ones I'm thinking of, but there's there's some images of other pictures and there's some images of some drawings and stuff. So you're kind of like dipping your toe into that already, right?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, exactly. I think um I would love down the line to try even do like a second version of Memory Bank where it leans more into that. Um a good example. I don't know if you've seen it, Gathered Leaves by Alex Soth is like a process book that he brought out that I that I have, and it's just to kind of even show more of the thought process about each image and like maybe have some more like handwriting and like illustrations and like mapping and stuff. So it's something I'm really interested in, and like archive and and and using found imagery and that sort of thing. So yeah, I I I want to lean more into that as more the more I go. Um, but it's also just getting a good balance of how it's executed because it can be very messy and you get kind of lost in it.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Just adds in a whole other element to cohesiveness and sequencing, I guess. But with memory bank specifically, what is it that you I guess hope that people feel when they've read through the book and they close that last page? What what is your hope for that infusion of some kind of emotion in in the viewer?
SPEAKER_01:It's a hard, it's a hard question because I don't really I try not to hold on to that. No, I don't I just don't hold on to that that idea too much. And like I'm not hoping for anything. I'm just I'm I'm just I'm just satisfied with a not even sales. I'm just happy to just go out there and make photographs and the fact that it's culminated into a book and that people have literally gone out and bought it is is good enough for me. What they take from it is is their own. It's like me trying to explain how I feel uh about taking images. It's just it feels futile. The feeling I get in my stomach when I'm standing over my camera and I've seen something in the street that I like, it's pointless trying to explain that. And like for me, holding on to hope that people take something away from the book would be great, and that'll be amazing. But I just want to look at the images and what they decide is is their own sort of business.
SPEAKER_00:So you know, at least hope for some kind of like inspiration or help, you know, it if it can kind of provide a little bit of an inspiring springboard to someone's own journey, is I mean, surely that that has to come into it.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I mean, if it makes people go make more photographs, that'd be amazing, or make more art, or um go see a therapist, or I don't know. Cut sugar out their diets. I don't know. Like, yeah, that'd be great.
SPEAKER_00:At least question, at least question some things.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, question something, but um I want it to be a personal sort of trip of self-discovery that I hope they don't, yeah, that they keep kind of dear to this themselves and not kind of put it out in the world and and discuss it with other people. It just needs to be this like intimate look at oneself, I guess. Because that's how I feel about the work. Like, even though I'm putting it out and being vulnerable and all of that, it's the real true feeling is you can't describe. So I love it.
SPEAKER_00:Um, I'm gonna end with a with a question. I I think is really, really stupid and silly, and it's uh I've asked it so many times, but for you who's out there in the commercial world a lot, I want to hear your thoughts on AI, right? How do you feel about the evolution of photography in in the current age of AI is moving so fast, but specifically with the the impact AI is gonna have, if anything, on your type of work in the commercial sector over the next few years?
SPEAKER_01:It's a good question because it depending on how you answer this, you might look incredibly silly in like six months to five years, or you might look like you can you can see into the future. Um I mean, uh it would be silly to say that I I wasn't a bit fearful of it all because I think we all have a certain itch in the back, back of our heads that's like saying, like, wow, like this could completely change the landscape of how I survive in terms of making money and like my financial standings in the world. But I think at the same time, like photography, um, and this is something that I think young photographers really need to hear, and it's and it's something that I feel like I've got to the point where I discuss it quite openly. It's like if you want to do photography, you've got to be ready to like get in the trenches unless you've like got a trust fund or your family's very connected in the advertising world, like it's gonna be a struggle, and it's whether AI is there or not, like it's it's hard and it's not easy, and like you you're out there and you have to put yourself out there and you have to be willing to take on rejection. And I think AI is just another thing to add to that. Um my feelings towards AI, I think at the end of the day, it is just gonna be part of our tool set, I think, in many ways. Um, and if it takes all of our jobs, then it takes all of our jobs. Like we're gonna have to be you're gonna have to be adaptive anyway. Like, you know, in the next 10 years, I'm gonna be 45 years old. Like, you're gonna have to adapt to be able to get clients in a younger space anyway. So whether you adapt to potentially getting another job or adapt to becoming a photographer that people still want to hire, it's still in it, like you're still adapting. So that's kind of how I see it.
SPEAKER_00:Do you see the brands that you're working with at the moment moving or looking at moving in in that direction? AI image generation?
SPEAKER_01:100%. I mean, I I I worked with a guy that whose name I won't mention or his or his company. I mean, it's a massive, massive brand. Um, he's heading up. He moved from the division that he was working at when I worked with him to a new division that's developing AI technology solely for the use in the creative space. But at the same time, I I I like to think, and I and this is where the the trap comes of this question. It's like I like to think that my work is quite different to what like people are trying to use AI for. I think potentially people that are doing e-commerce work or you know, product photography. Um I think those people are in potentially a lot of trouble. Or like very sort of maybe more mundane photography where it's very much about like functionality. It's like we are trying to sell, I don't know, water glasses, you know. It's like you need to just photograph this. Like that, I think those jobs are gonna be, but like the more emotive stuff that I feel like I create, it's gonna take a little bit of time. And I think the people wanting to create that work are more interested in the arts and working with art, artists, not necessarily photographers, but they still want that ecosystem to exist. Um so yeah, I think there'll just be two different camps that are working two different things, and uh yeah. The audience at the end of the day will be the ones that decide on that, you know.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, yeah, well, let's hope your um your memory bank doesn't become a memory bank of actual real images um that that that still exist today. So thank you so much for talking with me. I wish you the best of luck with the book. Just give us all an insight as to where people can find you, where people can buy the book. I think we've talked about it already, but just to just to cap it off, give us um give us some links.
SPEAKER_01:Cool. So it's kentandreerson.com is my website. It's got everything you need to know there. Uh, then I am on Instagram um for my sins at at Kent Andreerson. Uh, and then you can buy the book at wittibooks.com. Just go check out their titles there. You can pre-order it as well as get a pre-order and a print and get a selection of three different prints to your liking. Um, and then I will be at Paris Photo from the 13th to the 16th of November. If this comes out in time, come and say hello um and get your book signed. There'll be copies on sale there. Um, other than that, a quick chat GPT or Google search will find me.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, exactly. And we'll put all these links in the descriptions anyway, so people can find you with without any issues at all.
SPEAKER_01:And Matt, thanks so much to you for yeah, just the time and the insights and doing your research and asking all the easy and the tough questions. It's really appreciated.
SPEAKER_00:No, not at all. It was an absolute pleasure to I can't wait to get my copy of the book, which if I don't make it to Paris, I will have it before then, I hope. And actually, no, when are the the pre-launch versions coming out? When when do we actually get the physical copies? After Paris?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, after Paris. Once that launch has happened, then the distribution will start.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, cool. We're gonna try and get this out. Um, I'm not sure when people are gonna be watching, listening to this, but it'll be around that time, if not towards the end of November, sometime in the kind of second half of November for sure. So cool. Thanks again. Thanks for your time. Wish you the best of luck, save travels, um, incredible work, very inspirational, even though that may not be a hope for you. It's uh it's certainly something that I took from your work and continue to do so. So thanks so much for it.
SPEAKER_01:Thanks so much, take it easy.
