About this project

a photographic exhibition , a book , a collection of ghost stories and recipes from Italian Nonnas .....

I have suddenly been awarded my first ever artists residency with the Mira foundation in Puglia Italy,
and I need some help to make this amazing project come alive ...

This is a project I have been dreaming of for 10 years....
I will fly across the world
arrive in the heel of the boot of Italy,
and using the oldest and most original photographic techniques and equipment
camera obscura,
photograph the ancient trees symbolising worldwide peace.

Using pinhole camera, Kodak box brownie, and monorail (head under the darkcloth) cameras i will shoot black and white 5x4inch sheet film and 120mm roll film.

The trees are over 1000 years old and are protected and very fairytale
they are so gnarled and twisted they appear to have human bodies and faces interwoven inside the trunks
(very much like Arthur Rackham illustrations)

I intend to print up 7 of the tree images at giant size, the exhibition will feel like you are in a magical dark
fairytale olive grove...

there will be a second series of Olive images printed by hand as limited edition 5x4inch image contact prints from the negatives themselves on fibre based black and white paper.

During the 2 months artists residency I will be maintaining my blog showing progress and treasures and found oddities ...leading to the exhibition, this is viewable at http://littlematchstickgirl.blogspot.com/

For a decade I have been obsessing about Puglia, the region in Italy where I will be staying, ...for some reason the best bread, the best oil, the best food in the world originates there !!!
So during my time in Italy I will also be collecting up the best and most traditional recipes and ghost stories I can find, and ............hopefully learning to cook as well as putting the show together !!!!!!
These recipes and ghost stories may become part of the book I want to publish of Ancient Olive tree portraits. A collection of recipes and dark stories from the Italian grandmothers in the villages !!!
Can I be any more happy?
I cant guarantee to catch any ghost photos but ...will remain optomistic ... the stories alone will probably be spooky enough judging by the good "bonechillers" I collected in the north of Italy in recent years .

Kickstarter funds are what I need for my project for the airfares (around 2400USD),
sourcing film, processing, I may have to try and find some old pro lab sheet film processing equipment, to buy in order to go ahead with the film process.... then....
In order to bring the giant printworks to exhibition ready stage will cost more than 1200USD per print) ,
hiring darkrooms, photographic chemistry and paper, renting a tiny car for 50 days, framing for the first show at the end of November, and publishing funds for the first edition of the book...
definitely a very challenging project...

The artists residency has arrived at such short notice that I cannot apply for arts grants, which take 6 months for any response... so luckily I found Kickstarter and they agreed to back my project here.

Mira artists residency is a wonderful opportunity for fresh thought and new cultural absorption. It is exactly right by the Alberobello region where the trees I need to photograph are, so it is an incredible coordination of variables that have all come together coincidentally towards this project.
Their website is http://miraresidency.com and many artists have made beautiful works and great leaps forward in their artistic style and creative skills while there.
Mira provide studio space, rooms, kitchen and lots of back up and support and publicity and an exhibition at the end of the residency, but no funding ....

so here I am in Christchurch New Zealand , where we have just had over 1086 crazy earthquakes in the last 4 weeks. Look at this brilliant site http://www.christchurchquakemap.co.nz/ ; a new faultline has opened up directly beneath us in the last weeks...leading right to ... our dormant volcano...meanwhile Australia has moved 10 meters further away ... :D great rumblings are happening underground every day

I am taking you on a hiking tour of our blown out volcano
where I grew up....