No it's not

When i posted this, some time back, i had a range of rather different and misguided convictions. Cleaning out my hard drive, i stumbled onto the image, saved in one of the backup folders. However, between then and now, we learned a valuable lesson. Never go against your better judgement.



If you do go against it, your mistakes and bad decisions will gang up on you. And ...



You won't be one of them.

Old images from a broken drive

Back when i started photography, my mom would save all the pictures I'd send her. Meanwhile i broke the hard drive, one evening and lost quite a bit. I had already gathered quite a little archive which also contained bits from the first semester of Uni. Years later, she's remembered that she kept them and mailed everything back to me. Seeing them all these years later, turns out i wasn't exactly a genius back then - but some aren't half bad. Those I'm going to start posting every now and again, for a little while.



Back then. working on a Nikon FM2 was really the thing to do. These were actually test shots from my first "paid" shoot. I got twenty quid, basically the film money. I must say, i was shit at negotiating.

Untitled

Intangible Observations on Human interactions

"Human behavior flows from three main sources: desire, emotion, and knowledge" - Plato

I thought that by now i would understand things. Some at least. I've always been under the impression that, as time goes by, the issues i could not find a solution to, in the past, would somehow whither and disappear and that i would never come across them. But the trick is that, when you follow the same path, you tend to reach the same result. More often than not, the world appears to be disguised in a wise manner as such, behind these rows of linear events.

The more i spend trying to understand some people (the very few i am bothered to attempt and do so) the clearer it is that i will never succeed. Push comes to shove, it would seem that the people i try hardest to understand are those i least manage to, in the end. And just to make things absolutely maddeningly unhelpful, the reciprocity of this action is amazing. Amazing and annoying. People i cannot possibly care less about are easier to get along with than the few i do seem to care.

I quoted Plato because it promoted me to write about this subject in particular. Desire, Emotion and Knowledge. I have the Desire. That's most certainly checked. I should think that the emotion is still there, for the time being at least. However, by following this logic, it would seem that the thing i am quite proud to say i possess in a fair amount in all other aspects, i lack in a dreadful way with regards to the said topic. Knowledge.

Right. That's about it for my two cents on people and the unbelievably awkward, backwards and illogical way in which they seem to behave. Strange.

Addendum: wrote this while sitting at a pub, looking at the people around. Seems like quite the zoological garden this pub, if i am not mistaking.

My City of Ruins

The city i grew up in has always had a special place in my photography (to be read as "i've never actually ever taken proper photographs of Bucharest, except journalism stuff). So, since i got stuck there, volcano and all, i figured i should shoot some large format images of how i feel about the place. I got asked why do i want to move back, quite a few times and in shot, the images are a bit of an answer. I'll post a couple every day until they are all exhausted.



PS: I've also got the whole final project series done, but that's only going to be shown later on in the year, during the exhibitions.

To my critics

I really think you need to be better than me to be able to criticize my work. And you need me to consider that you are. This is just an observation on the comments that we got on the article about me as well as a thread post that a little fuck put up here (it's in Romanian and you should only translate it if you want to read pointless ranting). I really wish that old frustrated photographers would start selling newspapers and stuff. It would make our life so much easier. I do mean to be disrespectful because, as St. Vincent (the chick, not the saint) says "fear no gods, regardless of who they are". This little post just came along because i am who i am and because i completely disagree with the stupid way that some people see things. Old unsuccessful photographers that shoot weddings need to understand simple things like:

1) if you were good in the 80's, they passed.
2) you're probably way behind and stuck in your loop out of which you're too stubborn to get out.
3) by the end of the decade you'll be dead so you have to square with that. you're time passed. If you did your best, be happy. If you didn't there's loads of corners you and sit in and cry.

Later edit: when i say too old, there's a little quirk. If you're not willing to change your perspectives and adapt, you're too old. It's never been about age.

We shall be free

Last night i had a good friend come over, the one that i walked for 28 kilometers in the hot summer sun with backpacks and food to get to Sarmisegetuza Regia. After he left i spent a little while staring at the newspaper article about me. Strangely enough, it never actually felt like anything. I always imagined that i should be happy or sad or excited or ... somehow. But it didn't make me feel like anything. It was just something else i did.

I figured the reason and it's got something to do with my damn high expectations regarding any and everything, from driving to shooting to relationships and general human interaction. Perhaps i came to realize that my idea of how something should be will invariably be better, cleaner, faster and well ... better-er than reality. Reality will have chips and cracks and imperfections and their existence there will create an unhappiness which, i found, always overshadows the pleasure of the actual thing.

And now i take my foot off the gas, i park on the side of the road and stop to think: Is it really that, if you do learn and evolve (and implicitly so should your expectations) you will get to know an uncomfortable amount of information? Is it that the information and the things you imagine will always be better than the real thing and will almost always make you unhappy? Bogdan posed a good question last night: "Is it better to be an unhappy Socrates or a happy imbecile?". It's not ignorance that is bliss, it's stupidity and the comfort of not challenging and dissecting your core so much that you never really know what was there to begin with. I would observe, in this particular regard, that the need for self reflection and the desire to surpass your current condition as a being with the ability to be rational is in itself a rather damning activity.

Nobody tells you when you start reading and start questioning the process that if you do it right it will mess you up. It's just something that derives exclusively from extensive periods of observation and reflection (of which, it might indeed come as a shock, i am capable). I am not quite sure how and what needs to be done there. After the article, after my exhibition series and after all the brilliant things that have gone down this last period, i still tend to be critical (i suspect that indeed, if you are content with your work you stop evolving but this discontent with everything is just my way of being a complete idiot). I am still unhappy about how i do things, with my process and the fact that i am not as good as i expect myself to be. Dana and i were having this little debate regarding her opera singing and how she can relate to how i feel since she's rarely happy with her own results even though everyone else is mesmerized. I come to think that maybe we make art, we sing and we create objects to please ourselves. You're your own worst nightmare and most damning critic because in your head there's no place left to hide from yourself. You hide from others in your art but you hide from yourself in everything else except what you create. This is just my two pearls of wisdom for the day.

Answer

I got quite a few calls and mails yesterday regarding the article. And i considered it would be about time i mentioned that i am indeed an egocentric little fuck...in case it was not obvious until now. Just as a point of conversation, i mean.

Drunken mornings

I was thinking of doing installation art. Photography's lovely and shit but maybe there are some things that cannot be expressed through an image. So really, when i finish university i might just start doing installations as well. i would like it if anyone posted their ideas, impressions and stuff. But probably you won't.

Note to self

Master key - Lousy lock.

Bowler - Failed Negative

Found

I was surfing on random blogs and stumbled on UCA Fashion's blog where i found some of my images from Fashion BA people... Random.

Looking back

When i was younger, it seems that i was a whole lot wiser than i am now. At least in some respects. No point to the observation, just a though.



Some experimental painting thing i did. Terrible, i know.

Shotgun blowjobs, deadlines and art

I've always imagined laying hidden in a bunker after a nuclear bomb has blasted the crap out of everything on this planet. And years after the explosion, i would open the door and smell the fresh air. This is how i feel today. Liberated from the chains of the final paper.

After being one sad song away from deepthroating the barrel of a shotgun for a bit under a month, things are starting to pick up. I've got a shooting lined up, I'm getting to start my printing process and it feels like there's reason to leave my burrow and get out in the world. Not everything is peachy, win some lose some. But for now, we've won a battle. Let's enjoy it like Napoleon. Because just like him, we don't know shit about what's coming.

In other news, i found a guy who does the kind of things that i dream, or somewhat. It's a bit strange and uncomfortable to see the deranged stuff you dream floating on your screen. Kind of makes you want to ... do nothing and stare for hours. Checked. Here's some of his stuff. I'm not a sculptor, but i can say that his stuff is at least worth watching, if not even buying - if i was ridiculously rich. Rankin style rich. He really is something because i think we can all agree I'm not that big on complimenting people.

Kris Kuksi, ladies and gentlemen:

Presedinti si senzatii

In perioada alegerilor ziarele se vand ca painea calda. Si ce vinde mai bine in Romania decat senzationalul? Avand in vedere ca prin intermediul blog-ului am fost contactat de cativa jurnalisti de mare calibru, Ovidiu Zara si Madalina Prudea intre altii, va aduc la cunostinta faptul ca scandalurile cu Dl. Traian Basescu nu ma preocupa. Imaginile semnate de mine din campania 2004 nu arata presedintele lovind vreun personaj.

Pe de alta parte, cu doar foarte putina obiectivitate ati realiza ca este inadmisibil pentru un candidat la presedentie sa faca un asemenea gest, in special in public, in fata a zeci de camere si mii de oameni - si deci foarte probabil imposibil. Nu e o acoperire guvernamentala - pur si simplu evenimentul nu a avut loc. Nu gasiti ca este o coincidenta ciudata faptul ca a reaparut dupa 4 ani acest video, intr-un singur loc, la o calitate proasta si dintr-un singur unghi?

Domnule Zara - ce aveti de impartit cu presedintele nu este problema mea, cum nu este nimic din ce se intampla in politica. Inteleg ca vreti sa publicati articole senzationale, dar aparent articolele cu teme inteligente sunt mai bine vazute. Pentru o clarificare, va rog frumos sa lecturati motto-ul propriului Dumneavoastra blog. Poate ati uitat de ce sunteti jurnaist.

Doamna/Domnisoara Prundea - "nu vrei sa afle lumea adevarul? lasi un om ca el sa ne conduca?". Presa este, din ce stiu, o putere in stat. Daca ati aborda subiecte mai importante si/sau interesante, poate ati reusi sa faceti o schimbare adevarata.

Cand a fost ultima data cand ati publicat un articol despre proiectul de transport ecologic de la Londra, actiunile Greenpeace sau expozitia Titian de la Luvru?

Stiu, stiu, doriti sa aratati adevarata fata a tiranului care ne va conduce sau nu in urmatorii ani. Nu va faceti griji - daca la Facultatea de Drept se puteau cumpara voturi pro-Basescu la 50 de lei, la Gara daca nu ma insel se practica aceeasi metoda pro-Geoana.

Cred ca ar fi bine sa va revizuiti pozitia ca jurnalisti integri si obiectivi si sa va dati seama ca aceste stiri de senzatie ar trebui pastrate in gunoiul ce se intituleaza "Libertatea". Ultima data cand am verificat, EVZ avea niste oarecare standarde, dar observ ca se muleaza destul de bine pe segmentul de piata ocupat de publicatia mentionata anterior.

Arhiva de articole si imagini publicate de mine pe care o detine (ilegal de altfel - conform contractului au dreptul sa imi foloseasca materialele pe o perioada de 3 ani, dupa care intervine dreptul de autor - alt mit urban in spatiul mioritic din ce imi dau eu seama) nu va face obiectul nici unor discutii sau dezbateri pro sau contra Traian Basescu. Va rog frumos sa nu ma mai contactati pentru detalii sau marturisiri senzationale pentru ca ele nu vor avea loc. Apucati-va sa scrieti articole mai cu cap, lasand la o parte vedetele de carton, stirile bomba si masinile de lux. Romania merita jurnalisti mai buni decat voi.

Cu stima,
Radu Tudoroiu

I'm not dead

I haven't written anything because i don't do anything. I have been writing my research paper, which is close to the end, I'm just finishing my forth off road article (i need diesel money for December), I've just bought some artist canvas on some pretty basic stretchers which have been coated with liquid emulsion today and on which I'll be exposing Wednesday. Other tna that, for the past week I've only gone out of the house twice and i'm sleeping on half a bed because the other half is generally filled with research material, pictures, books and ... stuff.

So, I'll keep you posted.

On the way home

I always walk on the field next to the uni, usually in the evening and i've always loved how the lights from the skate park look. Not much to it, just a snapshot on my way home.

The House of Chirstmas Past

We were coming back from the sea side a little while back and i had the sudden urge to drive off the main road. I thought i saw what appeared to be a street i used to know, in a village that seemed delightfully familiar. I found the house my grandparents lived in, just off the asphalt, on a dusty dirt road, falling to pieces under some apple trees.

Not much was left of what i used to call our country house and somehow, breaking the lock on the front gate - that hasn't been touched for more than 17 years - i felt some flickers of childhood lurking behind the fallen barn and the old rotting house.

I remembered its bright blue window panes, the two terraces where we used to eat water melons and my sister hiding under the table, scared of roaring summer thunders. I saw our old Skoda 120 parked in the garden and mother and father preparing salads.

Since the last time I've been there, the days have blown most of our feeling circuits, fried the childhood on/off button. Memories change and flex with time, like skin, and the reality is never the same as how it used to be. You romanticize on how lovely it used to be, how beautiful she was, how green the grass was but the truth is, it was never as good as you fantasize and all you'll do by returning is pay homage to yourself and be disappointed. All you really know for sure is how things changed you - for better or for worse. Or so we've come to notice.

Photography, terrorists and idiots

Here's something Denisa sent me today. It's apparently becoming more and more annoying and police are just as useless as ever. We've had some pretty suspicious encounters with police where we were asked about cameras but seeing that we're photography students, we got of easier.

Still, who the hell do you think would take a medium format film camera to a surveillance shoot? What kind of Ansel Adams - infatuated terrorist do you really think exist in that country?

Important note to the police: THE TERRORISTS USE SILVER SONY CAMERAS AND ARE DISGUISED AS CHINESE TOURISTS. I SAW ONE PUT HIS MASK ON.

Now, the article:


Brit photographer who shot demolition of flyover arrested for terrorism



Alex took his camera out to photograph the demolition of a flyover (overpass) in Chatham, England. After refusing to give his identification to two plainclothes people who refused to identify themselves, he was arrested under Section 44 of the Terrorism Act (he did explain to the police and the mystery plainclothes people why he was there and what he had photographed, which is more than I would have done). The police officer put him in cuffs and led him down his town's main road and locked him in a police van. Once in the van, he was questioned about his views on terrorism. Later, a policewoman who said that he had caught her in one of his shots felt "intimidated" by him because he was tall (implying, I suppose, that he wouldn't have been arrested if he was shorter -- terrorists take note). Alex has complained to the police Professional Standards Department:


I believe the way I was treated was unjustified and wholly disproportionate. I assert that officer xxxxx misused her powers of arrest and demonstrated a poor understanding of the law in relation to arrest, the use of force, the use of detention, photography in public places, obstruction and the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2000. Furthermore I assert that officer xxxxx is unsuitable to act as a police officer or at the very least requires further training if she is intimidated by a male of an unremarkable stature taking a single picture with a camera pointed in her direction. I assert that officer xxxxx failed to follow the correct procedures when conducting his search of me and perpetuated the use of unreasonable force by refusing to release me from handcuffs. I assert that PCSO xxxxx demonstrated an unacceptable attitude by making a veiled threat towards me in relation to my future activities as an amateur photographer. I seek for these matters to be fully investigated, the process and outcomes of which I request to be shared with me. With regards to redress I seek a written apology in relation to any shortfalls identified with regards to the involved officer's conduct and consideration of compensation to be made to me for the upset, embarrassment and psychological trauma caused. I would also like Kent and Medway Police to liaise with Medway Council in order to identify the two unidentified men that initially stopped and questioned me. I seek for their conduct to also be fully investigated, the process and outcomes of which I request to be shared with me.

10.000

I just passed 10.000 views. Thanks people.