give and take. manchester, ENG UK
instructions: use a polaroid (or any instant film) camera. take photos on the "take" route. give photos on the "give" route.
write about your experience. take no additional documentation.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Give & Take
Monday 4 August 2008
Lunchtime, Manchester
Accompanied by my children, Charlie (11) and Bella (9), I took up a position on the cross of the T in TAKE – in other words on Nicholas Street or Booth Street. Booth Street, I think. Charlie was sceptical. Bella was equable. I was disoriented. Although I know Manchester city centre very well, having been born and brought up here and having moved back to live here five years ago, I found Eric’s map difficult to get my head around, mainly, I think, because he had played fast and loose with the points of the compass. I had pre-walked the routes of both GIVE and TAKE in preparation, but still I was turning the map this way and that.
We had a little trouble with the camera. One of the packs of film was
faulty. Nevertheless, we made a start. Eric could hardly be expected to
know, but the streets he had selected are not very interesting, being
mainly lined with office buildings and building sites. I took pictures
of the children, of a woman on a cigarette break, of a white-painted
walking figure indicating a footpath. Charlie got a good shot of an
older building at the dead end of Concert Lane, framing its four
windows nicely. Bella liked the look of a pair of wooden doors dwarfed
by the stone elevation of an unknown building on Chancery Lane (I
think); she snapped them. Charlie fancied some huge empty wooden reels,
as tall as him, that had held pipe or wire or something for
construction. I liked the graffiti on a rear door and more doors,
concertina doors, on Mosley Street West that rendered NO PARKING as
OAKN or NPRIG depending on which way you approached them. I suppose
there was a lesson to be learnt, that even the most boring streets can
yield some interesting shots when you look carefully enough.
When it came to embarking on the GIVE route, I hesitated. I wanted to
approach only people who looked as if they might be receptive to the
project, people who might ‘get’ it. Students, creative people,
happy-looking types, rather than harassed business people on their way
for a sandwich or builders intent on digging a hole or anyone who might
be intimidated by our approach. With this latter concern in mind, I
thought it would be useful having the children with me, but Charlie
started to hang back, embarrassed by his father’s keenness to engage
with strangers over a handful of Polaroids.
It was a while before we spotted our first victim, an elderly woman,
who listened without great interest and took a picture. We can’t
remember which one. Our next target was much more receptive. The kids
thought he didn’t look right, but I was certain he was worth a try.
With his streaked hair and shabby-chic designer clothes, his twinkling
smile and very slightly camp manner, he looked creative, artistic: sure
enough, he worked in the music business, back stage, he said. He loved
the description of the project and picked out the photograph of the
white figure painted on the footpath. As he walked off clutching this,
we felt hugely encouraged and uplifted. I’m sure he’ll keep that
picture, pin it up on a noticeboard in his kitchen, Blu-tack it to his
fridge.
We liked the look of a young woman checking out the windows of
recruitment agencies, but she turned the corner, leaving the GIVE
route. We decided we would not leave Concert Lane, one of the prongs of
the E, until we had got rid of another picture. Whoever came down the
street next would be approached. A man stepped outside one of the
anonymous buildings for a smoke. He didn’t look ideal, but we had made
up our minds. There was possibly a small language barrier, but he
didn’t get it. He didn’t get it at all. He looked at the pictures and
handed them back without a smile, but with a shake of the head.
Heading out on to York Street, we stopped an approachable-looking man
whom I completely erased from my memory until after the walk was over
and the children and I compared mental notes. I couldn’t picture him at
all. Even now I only really remember that there was a man. I remember
him being obviously gay, but that’s all I can remember about him, apart
from which picture he selected – the one of the four windows at the
bottom of Concert Lane. Bella couldn’t remember him either, but Charlie
could. He had jeans on, Charlie kept insisting, and a black shirt with
tiny white shapes.
I spotted a girl having a coffee outside Coffee Republic. I thought she
looked like a student. We crossed the road and I could see I’d
misjudged: she was all wrong, but we were committed. I launched into my
spiel and she asked in a broad Lancashire accent if we were having a
joke. Her boyfriend emerged from the coffee shop and took the photos
from her. ‘Vandalism,’ he pronounced, clearly not in favour of street
art. They refused to take a picture.
We struck lucky on Spring Gardens. A man was leaning against a wall
sketching in a book. His work was good. While we were talking about
graffiti – for that was the picture he chose – his leg suddenly gave
way beneath him and he fell to the pavement. I helped him up, wondering
if he was ill, but he explained he’d been standing in the same position
for so long his leg had gone to sleep. He asked for Eric’s name and for
my name and he gave us his: Ross Allen (I’m guessing at the spelling of
the surname).
Back on Mosley Street West, we decided to give the picture of a NO
PARKING sign (not the concertina doors, but another one) viewed between
two parked cars to the driver of one of the offending cars, in
absentia. We slipped it under his windscreen wiper and left in a hurry.
A very friendly blonde woman, young and trim, picked out the shot of
the giant empty wooden reels and complimented Charlie on his good eye.
Back on the street of recruitment agencies, we saw the same young woman
coming towards us who had been a missed target some time earlier. She
went off happily with the concertina doors. And so we were left with
one picture, the wooden doors that Bella had photographed. Charlie
suggested we post it through the door. We all agreed this was an
excellent idea, but the doors were sealed tight and since it was the
back of the building there was no letter box. But there was a square
section sunk into a metal plate, roughtly the same dimensions as a
Polaroid photograph. Part of the mechanism for opening the doors,
perhaps, but obviously little used. It was possible to lodge the
photograph in position at the top and bottom. The snap bowed out
slightly, but that didn’t matter. We all enjoyed the artistic joke of
affixing a picture of the object on to the object itself.
The walk was over, project finished. We felt good. That feeling lasted for some time.
Nicholas Royle
Nicholas Royle was born in Manchester in 1963. He is the author of five novels – Counterparts, Saxophone Dreams, The Matter of the Heart, The Director’s Cut and Antwerp – and one short story collection, Mortality. He has edited twelve anthologies including A Book of Two Halves (Phoenix), The Tiger Garden: A Book of Writers’ Dreams (Serpent's Tail), The Time Out Book of New York Short Stories (Penguin), and Dreams Never End (Tindal Street Press). He lives in Manchester with his wife and two children, and teaches creative writing at Manchester Metropolitan University.
Visit his website: http://www.sinfield.org/nicholasroyle/index.htm
________________________________________________________________________________________________________