Nicolas Laboire, is a French photographer who has lived and worked in London for over 25 years.
His Presentation at the Brighton and Hove Camera Club on Tuesday 30th January 2018, entitled
“Tin Tribes in the garden of Ether and Wet Plate Collodion” was about personal work that he has been doing using an old Wet Plate Colldion Camera. This camera was invented by Frederick Scott Archer in 1851.
Nicolas coats the glass plates with a highly toxic mix of chemicals which he mixes himself. He described the process as taking approximately 7 minutes for each plate, which includes coating the glass, exposing the image and then carrying out post process methods to fix the image
He has won national and international acclaim with this set of portraits in which he mixes contemporary figures with this antique method of image making.
Portrait of Britain Entry used as a bill board poster – by Nicolas Laboire
The first half of the presentation consisted of Nicholas showing his images on a projector and talking about how he had made them. He said that always looks for the story in the image.
The second half of the evening was demonstration of the process he uses to operate the Wet Plate Collodian works, followed by a question and answer session.
My impressions
Nicolas clearly enjoys the whole process of making the image, including buying and mixing the chemicals, right through to finished plate. Rather than producing a digital image he enjoys the making of a ‘product’ that is original and can not be replicated. I found the project images a little bland, but the images really come to alive when you see and hold the plates.
I felt this was a really ‘photography as art’.because of the tangible product produced. which was so much better in the flesh than the printed image. Nicolas was very engaging and passionate about his work and i found the whole evening, both informative and interesting. Particularly learning more about the history of photography and the danger early photographers were in.
client’s of early photographers often didn’t like their images because they were used to painters who amended their imperfections. Reminded me of what we do in Photoshop now, so maybe we’ve come full circle!
When asked if he was a fine art photographer or a photo journalist, Nicolas replied that “if you take an image from a newspaper and hang it on the wall, it would be called fine art. It depends on what you want to do with the image.” I really liked that analogy and felt that the really didn’t want a label, he just wants to take photos that tell a story he wants to tell.
He is currently working on a set of images about suffragette in order to celebrate 100 years of (some) women being given the vote.
for more info about Nicolas visit his website: http://www.nicolaslaborie.com (accessed 31.01.18)
