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Greek Magazine Erotorama Inverview

Bound women and extremely erotic images that seem to have fetish characteristics. But still Marc Blackie's photographs have no relation with bondage... they simply compose the unique art of the British artist. Marc Blackie talked to Erotorama about his differentiation from bondage art and he analyzed his exceptional photograph work: Disappointed Virginity.

Marc, how did you get involved in fetish and bondage photography?

I don't consider myself to be working in these two areas – though am aware that my work is often described as being of such. It's probably worth mentioning here how I see my art, which is as being part of a single and self contained mythology that has evolved during the course of my time as a photographer.

I have in the past exhibited my work at fetish themed events and galleries and also featured in fetish photo anthologies and magazines, but this isn't something I particularly want to do in future as I feel it is a misrepresentation of my themes – which whilst sharing certain trappings are coming from a different direction.

I'm not going to deny the fact that rope work does feature in what I do, but I don't consider that to be a driving force behind my images and therefore make them fetish or bondage in intent – more as another string to my bow of influences.

Could you describe your feelings when you shot your first bondage photo?

I really can't remember the first time, but as I do all the rope work myself I would imagine there was some degree of awkwardness and trepidation when it comes to basically man handling a stranger in what is going to be thought of as being a sexual context.

I am exceedingly methodical when I am working though, so like to think that I am yet to make someone feel uncomfortable with whatever is occurring. Though unnervingly enough, some models have confessed to getting somewhat aroused during such things – which is shocking and highly unprofessional behaviour!

Why did you choose to shoot your photographs only on black and white? A Greek photographer once said that color photos are only for advertisements.

I am self taught and until recently was shooting entirely on film. When I began learning, it is obviously a lot easier and less time consuming to develop and print ones own work if it is shot in black and white, especially when making do with makeshift crawl space darkrooms in cupboards and blacked out bathroom windows. So what might have once been seen as a limitation developed (ho, ho) into a style and rule that bound, bind and confine what I do inside a cozy bundle of parameters.

I do shoot colour from time to time for other projects and am comfortable in doing so – but as my work under the Disappointed Virginity label is all part of a larger story, to begin using colour within the series now would detract from this

So I suppose a short answer would be, I have devised for myself a particular style which suits the ideas and moods that I aim to create and for the time being I see no need for this to change.

How do you choose your models? What characteristics should they have in order to collaborate with you?

I have an immediate "Yes or No" gut instinct when choosing who to work with – so it is hard to nail down precisely what makes me choose the people I do. We all have particular ideas of what we find attractive and this is going to play a large role in my decisions – though I do like to think that I have an ability to choose people who "get" where I am coming from and can understand a little of the ideas going on behind my eyes.

I noticed that many times in your photos you focus on your model's breast. Is that your favourite part on a woman's body?

Yes, as most men (the ones that prefer the female form at least) I am fond of the female breast, which in my case might be bordering on a fetishism all of itself. I do sometimes wish that I wasn't so predictable, but yes…I like breasts very much. Sorry about that.

Why do you write slogans or words on your models' body? For example "Sik of Sex" or "Masturbation solves nothing".

I like words. Maybe it is lazy of me to feel the need to resort to text to convey meaning in my photos, but then again I have nothing against subtitles in movies, so there is a comparison to be made there. These images will often begin with the phrase or the slogan and I will conjuror up a set piece to include this. In doing so I have used phrases from books or songs I like, random thoughts or even been given an idea by the model with which to build my own ideas around.

I will point out that there have only been three or four occasions when I have actually written on a model's body – so try to have text appearing by other means when I choose to do so.

A lot of your models have big breast and curves, what is your opinion about skinny models?

My personal preference is for the larger bust sizes and for curvier women, so models with these characteristics are most likely to be my first choices when arranging a shoot. It would be false to say that I have no appreciation of thinner models though as there are certainly quite a few to be seen within what I do.

I'm no good at photographing asses though and it's pissing me off. I've got the whole breast thing mastered now, gotta practice on the backside, so to speak.

What is your opinion about the kind of par example Playboy's nude photos?

I have no criticism of Playboy and by extension of that, of pornography. I have some degree of concern about the ease of availability of certain kinds of hardcore porn these days – which will probably make me sound like an old stick in the mud…yet I don't think a world within which people in their early teens viewing some pretty extreme porn from the comfort of their bedrooms is a good thing.

You know? That whole "warping of sexual identity and expectation" thing might just be irreparably fucking up a generation or two here.

Or I might be just imagining it all in some tooth grinding, floor beating fit of post adolescent sexual envy. Back in my day I had to read the Marquis de Sade and Story of O to get my jollies….kids these days don't know how lucky they are!

The internet as blessing, the internet as curse…the internet as the great Saturn that chokes as it comforts. What can we do? Lay on our backs and blow bubbles in the name of progress…masturbate our little virtues away for the sake of convenience. Point and click, baby.

I also noticed that the girls that you shoot are not the kind of glamour models, are more like the girls of next door. Tell us about this.

My desires and imaginings, as bizarre as some people might find them, have to have a basis in reality – and the concept of the glamour model immediately dispenses with this. I have photographed cover girls and porn stars and will do all that I can to corrupt the notions of beauty and attraction that might be associated with such models.

I much prefer working with girls who either have little modeling experience or who have no aspiration to be a model and am lucky enough to be approached by a number of people who, for whatever reason, are drawn to my work and want to express themselves within it, without any desire to be a model or work with other photographers. This way, I am allowed the privilege of working with an individual rather than a model and therefore a fake persona.

Many times you use dolls and teddies in your photographs. Has this any relationship with the title of your website "Disappointed Virginity", I mean do you like to bring out a girlie and "innocent" style in you photos?

I'm a fan of extremes and their opposites...corruption and innocence, love and hate, Eros and Thanatos, black and white...that sort of thing. Having said that, I'm not actively attempting a corruption of innocence wherever I can and the term "Disappointed Virginity", when interpreted as a criticism of chastity or a failing of sexual pleasure is no sort of direct manifesto of my purposes; as I have discussed elsewhere.

My use of dolls is an often homage of mine to Hans Bellmer, who has been extremely influential within my own work. The eroticism of the female form as passive, lifeless doll - as ornament or plaything if you will, interests me immensely - on one hand the ultimate form of subjugation and on the other the highest form of adoration and impossibility.

I also practice my photographic techniques on the various dolls and mannequins I own, so sometimes I will view a model as such also – made manifest in a few particular photos where I can be seem actually moving and positioning the model as though a lifeless figurine.

Also sometimes you use chess as main object in your photos. Why?

This is a reference to some of my writing and songs, "A chess piece playing snakes and ladders, a block of ice inside the furnace, an embryo inside an ant's nest" - a poetical allusion to the idea of finding oneself ill (or inappropriately…) equipped to deal with a given situation. This was re-enforced by the photo that most recognizably takes this as a starting point – the model sports recently severed hands and is engaged in a game of chess, which includes sex toys and insects as well as the usual chess figurines as pieces.

The fact that she has no hands makes her even less equipped to win this impossible game that she is playing, so the poor girl probably deserves some degree of compassion from the viewer.

The chess board was also an early obsession of mine. Long before I was taking photos, the concept of black and white fascinated me and I would produce intricate line drawings with the checker pattern as a foundation. I obsessed over angel fish (with black and white gravel arranged in a striped pattern) and would visit zoos to look at the zebras for hours ("Is a zebra a white horse with black stripes or a black horse with white stripes?" so the chess board image was bound to reoccur eventually.

In many of your images you photo some things that we use them in our every day life for example spoons and forks, tell us about this concept of yours.

I, as most of us do, lead a life of fairly banal domesticity…and I find myself inspired by what is around me. I like the concept of "Domestic Esotericism" which is a term I first applied to some of my early writing and has since evolved into the "Domestic Eroticism" on display in my photography.

I have to emphasize the point that all of my work takes part inside of a closed world, a parallel universe of Avant Garde sexual deviation where the people involved find themselves as willing "victims", who have some how stumbled into this situation of otherwise.

Now this universe doesn't consist of a fantastical and improbable environment where people don't drink tea, use the lavatory or have to brush their teeth. No sir. These are normal people, leading normal lives inside of an ever so slightly twisted set of rules and experiences. So I find it perfectly reasonable that they might want to feed the occasional boiled egg to a mannequin.

There is a photo of yours with a girl with amputee hand, was this a photo trick?

Yes of course. I have done a few similar things with "missing limbs" and I would like it to be known that none of this is achieved with photoshop, as some people have presumed. All done with old theatrical tricks, false limbs and various props.

You rarely shoot men and if you do are like a part of the background of your photos.

The only male to feature in a Disappointed Virginity image is myself, thanks to timers and remote controls. This is an extension of the implied presence of myself that exists in a lot of my work. I think this came about originally on a shoot I had…the photo was looking good, but missed something in the background. I remembered someone saying how their favourite image of mine was "the one with the scary guy in the background" which didn't exisit – had been a shadow formation the viewer had presumed to be a figure. So I decided to take on the role of "scary guy number 1", to stand about menacingly in the background and it worked.

This figure over seeing events in front of the camera instead of behind it added another degree of my personality to the finished product and it has become another of my themes.

Although your art is dedicated to bondage in most of your photos girls are alone they don't dominate or they are dominated by someone else.

I don't like the word "Dominate" as it suggests a sexuality that I don't find relevant to my work, but I would say that it is rare for the model to be alone in the images. An external force is nearly always present, even if that "force" is off camera. Very often there is the feeling that "something" is occurring…not just a model posed and looking pretty…usually the viewer is given the idea that there are events that have lead up to the still they are looking at and left to guess what happens next…or at least this is my intention!

I wish you'd stop saying I'm a bondage photographer though, it just ain't true.

In some of your photos your model is holding a cigarette, do you find this a sexy pose and generally what means "sexy" to you?

I'm a smoker myself and it has become a motif of sorts that if I am making a background cameo there will usually be a cigarette burning between my fingers. This carries over into shots of the model alone sometimes…there is a not very well kept secret that a girl smoking a cigarette can have a sexual connotation and there is also the idea (a very valid one as my medical student friends keep reminding me) that smoking a cigarette is a harmful and addictive act that serves no purpose other than to give fleeting pleasure, satisfy a needless hunger and do great damage to those indulging… which strikes me as a good metaphor for decadence.

Saying all this, cigarette smoking isn't a conscious element of my work…just keeps on creeping in there.

Oh and it just does look sexy. It does. It you think otherwise, you are wrong. Though I will admit, it doesn't sound quite so sexy coughing like a cancerous walrus first thing in the morning.

Are you put in a position where you have to defend S/M?

I do get a surprising amount of "hate-mail" about how degrading my work is to women and sundry accusations of misogyny. I'm happy to discuss what I do and explain where I personally am coming from, but I'm in no hurry to categorise my self as a S/M apologist.

Who are your favourite fetish photographers? What about their photography moves you?

If I had to mention photographers names whose work I enjoy, I always come back to Nobuyoshi Araki, Francesca Woodman, Romain Slocombe, Jan Saudek and though he wouldn't be classed as just a photographer, Hans Bellmer is of great interest to me. In fact, stop reading about me and go and look him up – he is far more worthy of your attention.

For the most part, my work is influenced and inspired by books and other artforms though – for example I am currently undergoing an obsession with the Japanese film maker Koji Wakamatsu – how much of which is down to inspiration as opposed to certain similarities I have noticed though, is hard to say. His 1969 film "Go, Go Second Time Virgin" is such a great combination of nihilism, sleaze and rock and roll – it should be taught in schools. Go watch that now, after studying Hans Bellmer.

I have no real interest in my contemporary photographers. Their work just doesn't interest me – I have used this analogy before but I see a bunch of people photographing each others footsteps with out much going on in the way of individual voices. Their work becomes indistinguishable.

Which isn't to say I blanketly dislike anything produced in the last few decades, I guess I'm just choosey. Yoshitaka Kawakai and Daniel Martin Diaz are producing some great work at the moment, admittedly without the aid of lenses and mirrors, but still….and I have a soft spot for Richard Kern, even if he spends his time producing slightly better shot than usual porn these days.

What is your own favourite fetish?

I have no time for fetish wear, latex or leather or corsetry or whatever. Blah, blah, blah. Hold's no fascination for me what so ever.

I would say that I would rather not discuss my own personal tastes, but as my website pretty much serves as a dictionary of my sexual interest then there is not much point in modesty.

I would refer the curious to my work for further details – though urge you not to inform the authorities on whatever you might uncover.

Marc, you have said that a lot of people ask you why you photograph only women. It is obvious that you love this theme, but what is the ideal woman like for you?

Ah, such a thing can't exist…alas. If only it where so easy! I could tell you that I enjoy beauty, intelligence, wit and creativity (along with patience to put up with my many and varied failings) but that would be as meaningless as to say I do not find ugliness, stupidity and dullness attractive.

So no easy answers to this one I'm afraid.

Have your ever dealt with painting? And do you have any favorite painters?

I don't feel in anyway versed enough to discuss painting at length, though I am an admirer of Goya, Munch, William Blake and Bosch and have a lot of respect for what Vermeer achieved with light and shadow. These are all obvious choices, seems almost ridiculous to say.

I am very fond of the works of Austin Osman Spare – who not a painter (his colour works where rendered in pastels, pens and pencils), deserves far more recognition than he is allowed. This is probably down to the fact that he was an occultist of some note and notoriety, but if we can forgive Blake his Christian Mysticism we should be able to allow Spare his own indulgences.

Aleister Crowley, however, couldn't paint for shit.

Photography is the artform of which I have the least respect and the highest attraction, so make of that what you will. Sculpture fascinates me – the process involved I have nothing but admiration for. The end results however, leave me completely empty.

I painted when younger, for some reason everything ended up being an apocalyptic landscape due to an early obsession (bordering on mania) with the concept of nuclear holocaust. I grew very tired of the lengthy process involved though…the quick point and click fix of the SLR, oh it needed offer only a slight effort by way of seduction, a hint of shoulder, a slender thigh….and I was there panting like a bitch.

Tell us some things about the videos that you make.

These are a new venture of mine. Have only put together a few short pieces as yet as I am very much finding my feet in the medium – but they are largely inspired by various fan videos people have made of my work and posted on youtube and similar sites. These are montages of my images with music underneath them and as I am a musician myself and have scored a number of short movies it occurred to me to shoot some of my own footage and write the music for them myself.

In a way, these films turn out to be not much more than "Pop Videos" for my "These Papercuts" music project – but I enjoy making them, the actors seem to have fun appearing and folk seem to like watching them, so I guess everyone is happy.

You also are singer and songwriter. A famous Greek composer had said that music is like painting. When you shoot an image does this brings ideas for a song?

A review of my main band, "Sleeping Pictures", commented that "Blackie's lyrics are littered with lurid erotic detail" and I am happy to admit that a lot of my words are centered around sex and religion. I try to keep this particular project as a separate entity though – it is something that myself and long time collaborator Gary Parsons work with on a mutual basis and we both try to approach the creative process with a dedicated and clean palette devoted to the work.

Of course, external influences can creep in, I can think of a few lines off the top of my head that reference my photographic work ("A pin hole camera, flicks open for a second, captures all your sin" "His virginity, disappointed" etc) but generally, it's a separate deal.

What is your favorite kind of music?

I'm fairly diverse in my taste – currently listening almost exclusively to Venetian Snares. When shooting I like to play Zoviet France, Coil, Nurse With Wound, maybe God Speed! You Black Emperor or Silver Mount Zion. Am also a big fan of now defunct Arab Strap as well as Swans, Dream City Film Club, Acid Mother's Temple, Mono…I also have a peculiar interest in early video game music.

What do you like to do when you are not working?

My pleasures are my art, in their various forms. I work with three separate musical projects, generally shoot twice a week and am now spending sometime editing down some film footage I have been working on. In fact, this is being written as I wait for some video to render out to DV – a pretty time consuming process, so I am glad for something to be doing.

I read a lot (not as much as I would like, however) and enjoy various obscure movies, which thanks to ebay and a few select torrent sites I am now overwhelmed with.

I'm not what you might term a social butterfly and might go to a night club or party once every few months to remind myself why I don't go to night clubs or parties more often.

Marc you live in London, what do you love in your city and what are the things that you hate?

I neither love nor hate London, in much the same way that I have no particular feelings about my toe nails. They seem to be a necessary evil and I'm happy enough to get on with the business of having them. Has never really occurred to me to look into getting replacement toenails or feel any particular joy or animosity towards them…they're just there doing their job, as London does for me – as home.

What are you future dreams about your work and your life?

I should probably get some soon really…for a while now I have sort of been coasting along, producing my music, my photography and now my films. This in itself is of course very much of a dream come true for anyone with an artistic interest and I'm grateful to be in such a position.

I do hope to exhibit my work more in the future and ideally produce a proper book of my images – but until then I'll keep on coasting along, doing those things that I do.

I feel very flattered that people are interested in my work and very much appreciate the opportunity to discuss my art here. Thank you.