Nineteen Eighty-Four

It's a great city to walk, to take in its sights, smells, sounds. It's a city that overloads your senses, even one's sense of taste, London's restaurants and fast food joints has much on offer to be sated in this bustling metropolis of London. Yet, here I am walking the Regents Park Canal walkway, and central London seems miles away. I could be in inner city London shooting backstreets, however, today I felt like walking and taking in all that it has to offer, and it was a good decision. I find a series of shots, not all yet edited or posted to this site because I like to savour what I have taken by walking away from them,  I often choose the medium of film to shoot, rather than digital. My camera choice is an old Pentax MX; its great I have two primes; a 28mm and a nifty fifty to boot, that's all I need to get by shooting and documenting the street. Get home count my rolls, then get 'em deve'd at home or at Lomo. It's great because you can scan them and see what you do have then, edit them down, this one, in particular, is reminiscent of a novel penned by George Orwell, that dark dystopian backdrop, then I suddenly remember why it was I chose to walk along the canal, to escape the dehumanising capital, and it's fervent politics, leading up to an insecure future in the form of #BREXIT, yes, even the very colloquial term has earned a place in digital society, and granted an official hashtag!

1984 © David Rothwell

However, it's the future that worries me, it disturbs me almost, as I realise I have many friends who are European, and Arabian some Islamic by default, others Christian. Okay, I admit I don't define religion nor do I define race, what does that mean exactly, is it a race to the very end to see which of the species can last or, has earned the right to this third rock from the sun? That's pointless, surely we're all in this together, the insects of this world are just as barbaric as humans, however, those insects work and live together cohesively for the benefit of their respective species. I revert back to my own species and recognise that this woman, though granted is Middle Eastern, she absolutely has every right to exist in a country where she feels that it will benefit herself and her family. This brings me back to George Orwell's dystopian novel Ninety Eighty-Four, incredible writing which makes one feel his imagination, whirring about inside your head, to envisage such a time and a place, here finally I get to use my other sense, that of touch and to be able to feel that dystopian time within the very frame, I have taken.