Peter Fry
Specialising in arts documentary and promotions photography since 2005, Peter Fry has worked as a freelance photographer for many artists and events organisers including one off and longer term contracts for the culture teams at Canterbury and Ashford councils, Loop dance co, Animate Arts co, Whippersnapper, Accidental Collective, and Rewards Projects as well as many individual artists, musicians and performers including Phantom Lacuna, The Sketch, Stuart O’Connor and Paul Greene. This year I have been commissioned to photograph events at local and national projects such as the Herne Bay festival including the regional Olympics handover screening, the Ashford summer sounds programme including festival in the park, Sk8 side, big weekend, create music festival, and Saturday night Jazz, as well as Canterbury midsummer madness, the happy days music and family entertainment programme in Canterbury Whitstable and Herne Bay and two Big Dance events in Chatham high street and the Brook Theatre with Loop dance company. Later on this year I will be working on Canterbury’s animation festival ‘Anifest’ and the Medway youth dance platform at the Brook theatre.
Please explain yourself.
I’m Pete Fry, I’m a freelance arts documentary and promotional photographer, I live in Herne Bay and get twitchy if I’m away from the sea for too long.
Describe your work in one word.
‘ART !’ - there really is no way to answer that question without sounding pretentious is there?
If you could chose one single image you have photographed as your favourite, what would it be?
This is from accidental collective’s performance ‘In Between’ at last years Canterbury festival fringe. I quite like this as a stand alone image.
What’s the strangest thing you’ve ever taken a picture of?
When you’ve been working with the arts for a while almost everything becomes normal. Quite often I look for things that are strange or ugly when I’m working and do my best to make them beautiful in their own weird way.
Having said that, this was quite strange (taken at Midsummer Madness in Canterbury in the summer)
Do you have a favourite thing/theme that you like to photograph?
The arts - in all its weird and wonderful incarnations. I really enjoyed the work that I did with Loop Dance Company this year, I’d like to do more dance photography in the future, I find dancers very inspiring, they have so much energy.
Digital or film?
The heart says film the wallet says digital – sorry – one day when I’m working for vogue I’ll go back to film. (I know Vogue sounds very uncool, but two of my favourite photographers of all time worked for vogue, Lee Miller who was a war correspondent for vogue during the second world war and Ellen Nolan who did the photography for Beth Orton’s 1996 album ‘Trailer Park’ and has also done lots of stuff for Vogue alongside arty projects, I know that makes me sound very old but check them out, they really are very cool)
What are your plans for the rest of 2008?
I’ll be doing arts documentary work for Canterbury Animation festival (Anifest) at UKC and Medway youth dance platform at the Brook theatre in November and hopefully a few other projects that haven’t been confirmed yet. Beyond that I hope to carry on as I have been so far this year.
What is Canterbury missing?
A purpose built gig venue.
What is your favourite record at the moment?
It’s been around a little while but ‘Gimme That Punk’ by Audio Bullies keeps getting stuck in my head lately.
Which musicians / pop stars should be locked in a dungeon and why?
I used to be very scathing of all of them, but I’ve chilled out a lot these days. Most of them just seem too bland to hate, they don’t even enter on the radar. I can’t be doing with all these pop music talent shows though. I could definitely live in a world where they didn’t exist. There is some good pop music around – The Ting Tings for one, have put out some great pop songs recently.
Batman or Superman?
Definitely Batman, for one thing Gotham city is just far cooler than Metropolis. I guess I’m just a sucker for the darkness of it all.
What is your favourite record at the moment?
It’s been around a little while but ‘Gimme That Punk’ by Audio Bullies keeps getting stuck in my head lately.
Which musicians / pop stars should be locked in a dungeon and why?
I used to be very scathing of all of them, but I’ve chilled out a lot these days. Most of
When was the last time you embarrassed yourself?
I’m always embarrassing myself… best not add to it here.
What was the last dream you remember having?
I don’t remember, it’s been a while – I think I’ve been working too much.
What is your favourite film?
If I had to narrow it down to one… I’d have to choose ‘Dead Man’ (Jim Jarmusch 1995). The photography is amazing and I’m a massive Blake fan. There are so many films I love though, I’m sure I’ll change my mind in about five minutes.
Tell us a joke.
I’ve never been great at remembering jokes…
What goes ‘oooooooo’???
A cow with no lips
(Sorry, I know it’s terrible, I studied linguistics at Uni and that one just popped back into my head for some reason)
What was the last thing that made you angry?
I try to be a bit philosophical about things as much as possible, I get annoyed about stupid everyday stuff, but I can’t remember the last time I was really angry. I get angry about a lot of political things, Iraq and Darfur spring to mind as things worth getting angry about but like everyone else I don’t actually do anything about these things – maybe that makes me worse than someone who doesn’t know about them, I don’t know.
Crisps or chocolate?
Chocolate in the morning, crisps in the afternoon – don’t know why. Its like drinking tea with breakfast, it’s just somehow wrong.
Do you have a favourite place in Canterbury?
I like it up at the Gulbenkian Theatre… most of the pubs I’ve grown attached to over the years have closed up shop (the Tudor Tavern, The Cardinal’s Cap…) There are lots of places that bring back good memories of being a student at Canterbury college many moons ago – The Cherry Tree is definitely one of those. They put on some good gig nights at the Beercart Arms.
Who would win in a fight between astronauts and cavemen and why?
Cavemen surely, do you not remember captain caveman?
Favourite saying?
My granddad used to say ‘Half the lies I tell aren’t true’ – I always liked that.
Is the truth really out there?
The truth is almost always relative but if by out there you mean in the world somewhere then yes, for all my arty philosophical babble I’ve always been an empiricist.
Is there anything you'd like to shamelessly promote while you're here?
I have a myspace at www.myspace.com/peterfryphotography. I’m always looking for new areas to branch out into and not strictly limited to the arts, so if you want to commission a photographer please look me up or send me an email at pfp.arts@googlemail.com - you’ll find my rates very competitive.
I also write poetry, or at least I have done in the past – I don’t get so much time to think these days. There is an experimental music collective that took their original inspiration from some such ramblings of mine. They are called Midnight Moth (myspace.com/midnightmoth) named after an unpublished book of poetry I wrote called the plight of the midnight moth, and are led by a very talented friend of mine, Stuart O’Connor (myspace.com/stuartoconnor) who is a full time singer songwriter and gigging musician. They both have music out on Late Bus Records. Check them out sometime.
What is the meaning of life?
I’m starting to think there isn’t one, but that doesn’t mean that it isn’t worth living. Meaninglessness and pointlessness are two very different things. Language can be very liberating…
Thank you for your time.
Cheers.
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