Paita – The Shirt
Valokuvakirja / Photo Book
Savukeidas 2015
Kansi / Cover Jorma Hinkka
Paita – The Shirt on valokuvausharrastukseni tähän asti merkittävin ja oudoin seuraus. Elokuussa 2014 kuvasin 87 itselleni tuttua ja tuntematonta ihmistä yllään Morrisseyn esiintymispaita vuodelta 1984. Kirja sisältää nämä kuvat ja lyhyen selittävän jälkisanan.
The Smiths soitti kesällä 1984 Provinssirockissa sunnuntain viimeisenä esiintyjänä. Keikan lopussa Morrissey heitti – noista ajoista lähtien säilyneen tapansa mukaan – yleisöön paitansa, valkoisen naisten polyesterpuseron, jossa oli mustia kukka- tai lehtikuvioita, ja tuli uudelleen lavalle päällään samanlainen paita, jossa värit olivat käänteiset. Tämä musta paita esiintyy kirjassani. Keikan jälkeen muuan herkkävaistoinen ja rohkea fani marssi nimittäin backstagelle ja kysyi Morrisseylta, saisiko hänen paitansa. Morrissey antoi. Vajaat kolmekymmentä vuotta myöhemmin tapasin tämän fanin, Marko Helistön, joka mainitsi paidasta minulle, ja kohta suunnitelmani oli valmis.
Paita – The Shirt edustaa valokuvakirjan kituliasta ja huonosti ymmärrettyä lajia. Mustavalkoiset kuvat on painettu yhdellä värillä (joskin musteessa on 20 % reflexblue-sinistä). Osa arkeista on selvästi painettu liian vähällä musteella, siitä harmaus. Se on minun silmissäni kirjan ainoa vika. En ole mistään kirjastani yhtä varauksettomasti ylpeä. Paita on myös yritykseni vapautua sanojen tyranniasta, puhua ilman niitä, välittämättä siitä kuunteleeko tai ymmärtääkö kukaan. Olen loputtoman kiitollinen niille kymmenille ihmisille, jotka kirjaani osallistuivat, kukin omine motiiveineen, joita en kysellyt.
Kuvasin kahdella Canonin FD-rungolla Foman mustavalkofilmille pop-up-studiossa, jossa seinät olivat auttamatta liian lähellä. Jouduin käyttämään 35 mm:n laajakulmalinssiä, ja monissa kuvissa näkyvää salamanjalkaa ja muita epäolennaisuuksia oli mahdotonta rajata pois, mutta lopulta niille tuli kokonaisuudessa merkitys ja tehtävä: kaikki ”mallit” ovat paitsi samassa paidassa, myös samassa paikassa, eivät nimettömässä ja kliinisessä fotograafisessa avaruudessa. En halua peitellä harrastelijamaisuuttani, mieluummin alleviivaan sitä.
Alkuperäiset 18×24 cm:n hopeagelatiinivedokseni reprosi Tuomo-Juhani Vuorenmaa, ja kirjan suunnitteli Jorma Hinkka. Kirja rahoitettiin osittain Mesenaatti.me:n joukkorahoituskampanjalla.
Tein kirjasta 40 kappaleen numeroidun erikoisversion, joka sisältää RA-4-värivedossarjan, kolme lähikuvaa paidasta. Kuvat on tehty kokonaan kemiallisessa prosessissa. Lisäksi ”Deluxe Edition” on koteloitu DIY-henkiseen kartonkikuoreen.
Kirjan valmistuttua tein joistakin ”malleista” myös haitarikirjan, ”Solo Editionin”, johon vedostin kaikki kuvatut ruudut.
Author's note
From the photobook Paita – The Shirt
Clothes are an important part of us all, but the shirt is a particularly important part of Morrissey.
It is a material token of his body. Time and again he takes it off, as if peeling his skin, and throws it off into his audience, as if feeding lions.
The world is full of Morrissey’s shirts, but they are usually in shreds – which is natural, as they have been thrown to ravenous beasts.
Shirts in good condition are rare. This book is based on one.
In the evening of the 3rd of June 1984, The Smiths had just left the stage at the Provinssirock Festival in Seinäjoki, Finland.
Backstage, Marko Helistö approached the singer and asked if he could have his shirt. He promised to give Morrissey his own in return. Declining this offer, Morrissey smiled, and handed Helistö the garment he was currently wearing. It was a black polyester blouse of the ‘Butte Knit’ brand, adorned with white tulip or leaf patterns and cute puffed sleeves.
It was one of the two shirts Morrissey had for the gig. The first one – which was identical, but with inverted colours – had been thrown to the audience during the gig. Its whereabouts are not known.
During the band’s entire career The Smiths did not tour continental Europe very actively. Seinäjoki was the northernmost place the band ever visited.
The 1984 appearance at Provinssirock was also one of the few Smiths gigs Morrissey describes in detail in his Autobiography (2013): “I recall standing at the lip of the stage as if dragged from a river, the microphone slipping out of my wet hand, and no one around to caution how rain and electricity are deadly components to the overheated flesh.”
To have witnessed one of the greatest groups of all time perform live in Finland at the time when they had just released their debut album is an altogether ennobling quality.
In this book, the names of such persons are printed in italics.
In December 2013, Helistö made another approach, this time contacting me, asking if I would be interested in using, somehow, Morrissey’s shirt from 30 years ago. Helistö knew me by appearance, and knew that I was a fanatical Mozophile, but also that I had just begun translating Morrissey’s recently published Autobiography into Finnish.
Helistö had himself sported the shirt whenever attending Morrissey shows. And he was certainly not giving it away.
It is, after all, ‘Morrissey’s shirt.’ It just happens to be in Helistö’s possession.
I pondered a few weeks. Then I had an idea. It was to materialise, first, as a two-week community art project in the summer of 2014 – and now, as the book you have in your hands.
I asked several people to wear the shirt. Then I photographed them. Many people also found me and the shirt despite of me, having heard of the project from elsewhere. A genuine desire to participate was the only thing I required of them. I shot all 87 people during the last two weeks of August in a cramped pop-up studio in Helsinki. I tried not to direct my models in any way, because I wanted the whole situation to show in the final pictures, in all its weirdness and emotional confusion. Some models had with them some props of their own, such as pieces of Morrissey’s shirts taken as keepsakes from other gigs.
Those two weeks left behind a strange, strong feeling of togetherness and at least 20 feet of exposed black and white bulk film.
I developed the films, and as autumn nights grew darker, I retreated with my negatives into the darkroom.
There, alone, I wondered and pondered on what all those people actually have in common. At least they are all very beautiful.
Saturday, November 15th, Morrissey was performing at the Finlandia Hall in Helsinki. It was the first of two nights, and Helistö was in attendance, in the front, wearing The Shirt, of course.
A couple of weeks earlier I had contacted Morrissey’s tour manager with a short message about myself and my current project.
Morrissey had apparently read my message and checked my link to the crowdfunding site for the book. Anyway, he spotted the shirt during the first half of the set and asked Helistö if it was his. Helistö assured him of the fact.
“Does it smell?” Morrissey then asked.
It didn’t, anymore. Helistö had felt necessary to wash it after my photo shoot sessions.
A little later, during “Kiss Me A Lot,” Helistö invaded the stage and hugged Morrissey.
Thus, the contact with Morrissey’s flesh, which had been broken for a few months, was ritually restored.
Already at the initial stage of my idea I had jubilantly, defiantly liberated myself from all obligations to intellectualise or verbalise the project. Words do often tire and annoy me, just as nails can be boring to the carpenter.
Images, by contrast, hold for me the promise of fresh air.
But still, now that I have refreshed myself with these people and these pictures, and my first book of photos is finished, my obligations feel more like temptations.
For this reason, it is all the more pleasant to refuse them.
Helsinki, November 2014
Antti Nylén
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Building up the 'studio'.
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The 'fitting room'.
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I took a FP-100C photo of each participant. These served as 'who's who' notes for me in the process.
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The book is finished. Numbering of the copies before the launch party in February 2015.
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Paita – The Shirt – Deluxe Edition, with three RA-4 colour prints in a cardboard sleeve.
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Paita – The Shirt 'Solo Edition'. An artist's book containing all frames of a particular person.
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Paita – The Shirt 'Solo Edition'.
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From the book Paita – The Shirt. Morrissey, Finlandia Hall, November 16, 2014.
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