Tim Walker

This post is a subtle continuation of my last post which discusses the wondrous being that is Florence Welsh, the machine, and my time with Amy. As I briefly mentioned, if my GP prescribed train tickets and friends rather than pills and referrals, this trip to London is exactly what he would have suggested. I submitted my dissertation proposal and only took with me some essentials, even leaving my trusty diary at home. Stress levels were alarmingly high due to deadlines and I wasn't even sure if I would be able to switch it off so easily. But in fact, I did it with such great ease that I wasn't even aware I had tried to de-stress, it almost happened naturally. This is what I call the power of people. I came home, took the weekend off, and went to Uni on Monday morning feeling like a new and revitalized girl. While I was in London I also spent the day with Jamie, a photographer friend of mine who shares my borderline insane obsession with the work of Tim Walker (a photographer). So, along with a little shopping, walking by the Thames, plenty of chats and coffee drinking, Christmas markets, and dinner, we paid a visit to the incredible Somerset House to go to Tim Walker's Storyteller exhibition.

Ever since studying art when I was sixteen-eighteen, I became aware of Tim Walker's ability to capture something of a special and raw meaning and quality with his camera. Since then, I became a model and therefore immersed in the core of the fashion industry, incredibly aware of how art, beauty, and creativity are so beautifully and gracefully interlinked through representation. As a model, it is sometimes all too easy to get lost in the way we work. We are glorified clothes hangers, dolls booked to be dressed and made up, just another number, another girl, another book of beautiful images, the next will always have something more. Oh goodness, it is easy to get stuck in something very lonely. However, there are always two sides to every story, depending on our mentality and our mindset when we approach it. There is something magical and exciting about being able to meet and work with people who believe in something more than what is immediately available right in front of us, who break the rules, who believe that something new can be created. From my eyes, there is a certain kind of eternal youthfulness and energy that wouldn't be alive if it wasn't for being able to access the imagination.

This is the other half of me, which is often hard to explain. It is difficult to capture, but it helps understand why I appreciate certain elements of beauty. When I post pictures of light and nature and things that 'look' lovely, it's not just because they look lovely, things have multiple layers and are always more than skin deep. These sights and pictures must be remembered because of the feelings they evoke from the strength in what we see. Perhaps this is just subjective and perceptive but it may help explain why it is that I adore the work of Tim Walker so much. The exhibition was wonderful, by the way. Very, very beautiful. My mother has bought me the Storyteller book for Christmas and I am very excited to open it in 12 days time. Here are a few pictures of mine and Jamie's day.