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Conversations with Tyler
Seamus Murphy on Photographing Patterns Across Cultures
00:54:41
Why the Irish see Russia in America, and other insights from three decades behind the lens
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Conversations with Tyler is produced by the Mercatus center at George Mason University, bridging the gap between academic ideas and real world problems. Learn more@mercatus.org for a full transcript of every conversation enhanced with helpful links, visit conversationswithtyler.com hello, everyone, and welcome back to Conversations with Tyler. Today I am talking with Seamus Murphy, who is an Irish photographer and filmmaker. He has numerous books, including photography of Afghanistan, Russia, America and Ireland. He has a book of poetry from Afghanistan. He has worked with PJ Harvey, the British popular music star, on two albums, including on Let England Shake. He does film as well. He's a hard person to summarize because there is, in fact, no one else like him and he grew up in the Dublin area. Seamus, welcome.
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B
Thank you. Lovely to be here.
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A
Just to start with Afghanistan, where you've spent a lot of time recently, correct?
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B
Yes.
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A
Is there an optimistic case for that country right now? And if so, what does it look like?
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B
I think the optimism that I would have for that country would be the people, and I think I've got a lot of faith in the people. You know, we have this impression of Afghanistan as being very conservative, very, you know, extreme. It's not at all. They're very. They're a very easygoing people and they've been in the middle of a lot of trouble, usually caused by people on the outside. You know, they're a small country, they're strategically between many powers and, you know, they've had a lot of problems in their time. I think the optimism I would, I would be looking towards will be the diaspora. I suppose the people that, that have left, the people that might be able to do something from outside, they're certainly keeping people alive by sending money back. So I would say also people's love, their love of their country is something special. It's not a sort of silly patriotism. It's, it's. It's really, really deep in their veins. And, you know, it's one thing to have a, you know, problems in your country and, and all the rest of it, but to actually have to leave your country, that's tough for anyone. But I think for Afghans, it's particularly tough because they have such a love for their country. So I would say, you know, the diaspora is probably the. Because people in Afghanistan can't do much. You know, they have to go along with whatever the authorities are saying. They're pretty impotent.
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A
Is there enough ethnic unity there to build a nation state or you think the path of progress looks quite different?
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B
Altogether, I think they do get on with each other. I mean, there are tribal differences, like anywhere. I think people want to get on with each other, and I think it'll be some upstart politician, someone who sees a way to make profit for themselves or make a name for themselves. They'll stir up trouble. Vested interests in other countries will promote one leader over another. That's where the problem lies. You know, I don't think it's the Afghans themselves. They're like you and me, you know, they're actually better at times than you and me. I mean, they really are harmonious people, very poetic, very able to have a laugh. You know, I've seen people make jokes in the worst of circumstances. So I think the thing about Afghanistan is if they were left to their own devices, they would be fine, but unfortunately, they never have that luxury.
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A
So in the 1960s and part of the 70s, it seemed Afghanistan was ready to grow, become a mature nation. And what went wrong after that point in your take?
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B
I don't know. I mean, you know, 79 was the Islamic revolution. 79 was the invasion by the Soviets. There was things stirring in the region. I suppose extremists were maybe heeding the call from Saudi Arabia. I don't know. I'm not an historian, but it just seems. It seems too coincidental that these two things happened very close to each other. There was things going on. And you're right. I mean, you look at photographs in the 50s, the 60s, you know, the people dressed like people in the West. You look at pictures now, and it's like going back 100 years, 200 years. But, you know, it's happened around the world, hasn't it? You know, religious extremism, it's not peculiar to Afghanistan. I think just Afghanistan's had a very bad taste of it, because they do have. They are in a strategic position where they can be exploited.
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A
How urbanized is Afghanistan now? Kabul's a pretty big city, or Kabul's.
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B
A very big city. I think when the Soviets invaded, it was something like 4 or 500,000 people. We're now looking at 4.5 million, something like that. The infrastructure doesn't keep up with it. When the NATO were in for 20 years, there was road building, there were projects that should have modernized the country. But there's also a lot of corruption. You know, corruption set in fairly early on. And, you know, you could. You could say that was the Afghan's fault, but I think actually the people that were giving the money, you know, the west should have Been more, more vigilant. I think they knew what was going on. You know, they, they, if they really wanted to solve the problem of corruption, they could have, they could have done more. But they must have known, you know, 2010, 2015, how things were going. Everyone knew there was corruption everywhere, and they continued to spend the money. And then, you know, when the time came, they said, well, we've spent all this money. Nothing to show for it. We're getting out. But they're the ones who spent the money, so surely there's some responsibility there.
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A
How enduring do you think Taliban rule will be?
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B
I don't know. I can't see anybody other than the Afghans going in and doing something unless we had another nine, 11. I mean, the only reason, in a way, the Taliban were kicked out in 2001 was because of 9, 11. No, no one was, no one was caring. No one was looking at Afghanistan. They were very interested. When the Soviets moved in, you know, the Cold War continued in Afghanistan. There was vested interests. The Americans poured billions of dollars of arms into the country and, you know, by. By indirect means created the Taliban. But, you know, now it's the idea of a Western force going in there and trying to, Trying to source something out. I can't see it happening politically. No.
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A
Do you think the more optimistic scenario is the Taliban reforms from within, or the Taliban is somehow overthrown?
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B
I think reform from within. And I think I was there last in December, and what I, What I found was there's definitely, you know, the younger Taliban, and probably, probably most of the Taliban do not want the draconian rules that are being brought in banning girls going to school. They want their sisters and their, and their daughters to go to school. It's widespread, and it's not just in the cities. I came across this in the country as well. So I think there are definitely. It's the leadership in Kandahar that's. And, you know, one or two people really. So I think that's maybe not going to last forever, and hopefully there will be some kind of internal recalibration and the Taliban, you know, opens up themselves to more outside influence and things normalize. That would be, that would be a good scenario. And I, and I, I was thinking that when I was there, that actually is. It's a very positive. It's a very strong possibility eventually that'll happen, because I think also the country needs it. The country needs it economically.
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A
Do you have a sense of what the current birth rate is in Afghanistan?
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No, no.
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But families are still having at least two children. So the population's growing.
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B
We know life goes on. It's like any. Any place like Afghanistan where I. Where I've been. You know, you arrive having read reports and you get there and you think, oh, my God, you know, life must be. Must be so affected by this. Well, of course it is, but. But, you know, life goes on and it's. It's quite extraordinary that they're not going to stop having children. You know, they love their children.
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A
But a lot of countries, the fertility rate has plummeted just because women have decided they don't want two or three kids. Right. Even in Iran, it's quite low. And this has not yet come to a point.
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B
I don't know if that rationale is promoted in Afghanistan by the Taliban. I haven't heard anything about it.
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A
How safe is it to go there now? So when you go, how safe do you feel?
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B
In some ways, safer than ever before. But I'm a man and I'm a Westerner and I don't have any, you know, particular history of shouting about the Taliban or, you know, fighting the Taliban. So, you know, for me, it's. It's easy enough. Law and order is, Is very. Is very strong. You know, if people rob things, they might get their hands chopped off. You know, that, that has an effect. So as. As an outsider, you know, as a Westerner, it's. It's safe. In as much as place like that can be safe, there's always the possibility of kidnapping, you know, and there are other elements that the Taliban, more extreme elements than the Taliban, you know, Afghan, ISIS and. And, you know, those people would be very dangerous. But go to Kabul, it's very safe, I think.
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A
Would I be less safe as an American? You have an Irish passport, right?
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B
Yeah. No, I don't think so. Like in Iran, you know, on the one hand, they're saying, death to America, but then, you know, outside of the mouth, they're saying, my brother lives in Michigan. You know, America is sort of saint and sinner for everyone.
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A
And what's the biggest practical hardship with being there for an outsider? Well, you know, boiling the water might be difficult or the electricity goes out, or there's a risk of dengue or. What's the actual biggest problem other than maybe than being kidnapped?
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B
Well, my biggest fear always is a car crash, you know, because I think they reckon that more foreign correspondents get killed in car crashes than in any confing zone. I'm always terrified. And also, if you're. If you're hiring a Driver. They're always trying to prove themselves that they're faster and they'll get you. They'll get you somewhere in a hurry. And I always tell them, please, please, just. Just calm down. And that would be my biggest fear. And it's always my biggest fear, whether it's India or Afghanistan or, you know, any other place.
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A
Is there enough congestion in the capital that you're not going to die on the road there? Or it's still an issue.
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B
Yes, yes. I love traffic jams. You know, I love when, you know, we've come from the Shimadi plane in the north, you know, racing down the highway three at a time, overtaking, and then eventually you get to the outskirts of Kabul. Har. And I breathe a sigh of relief as we slow down, and it takes an hour to get the rest of the way, which is, you know, not very far. I. You know, it's terrifying. Yeah, it's very, very slow. Very slow.
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A
Now, I found when I try to photograph rural Mexicans, they put on their most serious face. The entire body stiffens and it looks quite unnatural, but to them, that's what a photograph is, and I'm fine with that. How is it in Afghanistan?
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B
Afghanistan is particularly difficult because they have some kind of inbuilt radar. When they know there's somebody with a camera, they just know it. And as soon as they detect it, they start shouting at everyone, there's a guy with a camera. There's a guy with a camera. So it's very difficult to turn up somewhere and do something candid or even just to relax the atmosphere. It's a carnival thing. But I think what you have to do is you have to work around that. They do. They love having their photograph taken. And so you kind of play with that and you try and catch them as naturally as possible. I mean, a lot of the time you think pictures are candid, and actually, in actual fact, you've been talking to the person and there's a moment and you get it. So that's good. But, I mean, yeah, the biggest difficulty in Afghanistan is that people love to be photographed. So, you know, that can be a little bit tedious.
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A
And no religious strictures that are a problem.
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B
Not anymore. No, no, no. That was. That was back in 97. I was there in 96 when the Taliban took over the first time, and they. That was when they were stringing up television sets and, you know, undoing videotape. I mean, they say that it's idolatry to in any way lionize the human Face. That's why when you go to a mosque, you never see any faces. You do come across it. Sometimes somebody will give you some kind of chapter and verse that in the Quran, it says this about photography, and you go, well, when was the Quran written and when was photography invented?
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A
And if you think about the outside world, you have a sense of how photography has shaped how people perceive Afghanistan now, some iconic image or what's the effect and how realistic is it?
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B
I think, you know, like. Like anything, really, whether it's news or whether it's photography. You know, you do things that in some ways will capture people's attention. You know, you're trying to communicate something. And so rather than having 10 pictures of something boring, the 11th picture with someone. Someone doing something interesting will be the one that you. You like, that you strive for. And so the most dramatic, you know, the most intense will be the. Will be the images that make it onto the news or in the newspapers. That's just fact. But I think if you're interested in the subject and you start looking at the diversity of books out there and, you know, the collections of photographs from Afghanistan, there's a lot there of human life, daily life. It's not all doom and gloom. But, you know, I think it's also understanding the news business, you know, that it is this thing of headlines and it is news. So people want to see something new, something novel. And there's a. You know, there's a superficiality to that, for sure.
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A
The famous photo of the young woman with green eyes, that's from Afghanistan, right?
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B
Yeah, well, actually, it's from Pakistan. It's from the border. I think that family had. Had fled the Soviet, you know, invasion, and they were in the border. I think it was in the tribal areas, probably per shower.
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A
And is that misleading in some way?
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B
Misleading? No, I don't think so. I mean, the picture, you know, she's looking pretty. Pretty terrified. She's. But the thing, of course, you gotta remember at photography is that photograph was probably taken in, you know, the fraction of a second, and two minutes before that, she might have been smiling, and two minutes later, she might have been crying. You know, so I think the intent. The intent of the. You know, it's a chain of. It's a process. I mean, the person takes the photograph, the photograph gets disseminated. How it's used. It was used, I think, on the COVID of National Geographic. I presume they had a much wider. In fact, they did. They had a much wider story on what was going on in Afghanistan. If you read the story, you'd be filled in on what was going on. It was a very striking moment of the kind of fear, I think, that you could imagine a girl like that. Whether she was afraid at the time, I don't know. Maybe she was frightened of the camera. Maybe she was frightened of this white guy taking a photograph. I just don't know. But I think it also captured the beauty of that girl. And that's another thing about Afghanistan. People are absolutely beautiful. They're very striking. That I think that's important, you know, to see that side of it.
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A
Now, in one of your books on Afghanistan called I Am the Beggar of this World, you mentioned that Pashtun women are not supposed to show love and romance, even when they're getting married. Why is that?
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B
I didn't write that. That would. That would have been Eliza, I think. Eliza Griswold, a friend and journalist. We did this project together. Why is that? I suppose modesty. I really couldn't tell you, actually. Why? Tradition. For some reason.
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A
I have the same issue with Iran. So I've met many Iranians. They're quite impressive, very smart, highly successful, especially in America, and yet the country itself is virtually always not on a good track. And clearly there's been some negative outside intervention in Iran. But at this point, I can't really fully believe that's the main problem. There's something about Iranian society which I do not at all understand that holds back a certain kind of progress. Maybe there's some attachment to a certain impersonality in public life that they don't have, or disputes become too fraught, or the country is not sufficiently unified, even though the people are super nice. And what is it you think that internally might be the equivalent in Afghanistan? Because there's plenty of Afghanis in Northern Virginia. They're super nice, they're attractive, they've done very well. But at the same time, it's hard for me to believe that Afghanistan's problems are mainly about foreign intervention.
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B
Well, I think in the case of Afghanistan, you know, they're traumatized. I think there is definitely a trauma. They've been at war for over 40 years. Even if you do meet people in arlington or in D.C. or wherever, you know, they're carrying that with them. They're dealing with family that are still there. This is going to have an effect on you. You know, this is not an easy thing to deal with. So maybe that has something to do with it. I mean, I think in Iran, I suppose it's. It's. Is it the Iranians or is it the theocracy? I don't know what's holding it back. You're right.
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A
I mean, but they're not that separate ultimately. Right. Iran is a difficult country to rule, it always has been. There's so many different groups there. The Azerbaijanis, maybe they're afraid if they liberalize it will collapse into some kind of chaos or they don't want to be the next Lebanon or the next Syria.
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Do they have much choice? I don't know how much choice they have in that theocracy, but it has.
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A
A fair amount of support. It may not be majority support, but it has more support in Iran than it would find in most countries of the world.
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B
Yeah, there's a lot of traditional people there also. You know, again, you've got the trauma of the Iran Iraq war where, you know, a lot of people were killed and they're dealing with loved ones who'd killed, who were killed in the war. And to betray that, to betray them, that keeps people loyal. I think it's the same in the west, you know, I mean, in America people will be, you know, loyal to whoever president you have and will, you know, because they've lost people in wars, the veterans, you know, it's very hard to break away from that. You have to sort of tear up your history and say, no, no, this is wrong. Or, you know, I think it's, it's loyalty in some ways.
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A
What's the food like in Afghanistan? Is it good? Is it like food in Afghani restaurants in the West?
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B
Yeah, it can be.
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A
Can I just get pumpkin? Ask for kadu when it comes.
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B
Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, it can be. And in fact, you know, you can, you can go to the most remote little village and of course they're always going to have fantastic bread. You know, the meal, the food is, the food is very much a part of the, the social, the social thing. And you know, the tea, the green tea and the bread and then, you know, depending on the season, they're going to have wonderful fruits. Food is good. Food is good. Very meat based. You know, vegan would have a hard time.
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A
I think there's a poem in your book. Of course you didn't write it, but I'd like to know how you understand it. And I think it goes quote, I lost you on Facebook yesterday, I'll find you on Google today. What does that mean to you as someone who's been there a lot?
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B
Well, I just think it, you know, the times have moved on and it's no longer Just women at weddings writing this poetry. It's a reflection of the modern world.
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A
Why did Russia remind you so much of pre Celtic tiger Ireland?
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B
Friendliness, warmth, bit of a daily struggle, sharing things, being able to laugh at things.
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A
And that's changed in Ireland today.
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B
You think, you know, I've just come from Ireland and you know, it's all still there. And in fact, you know, I think that what happened was when the Celtic Tiger happened and then there was that terrible crash, they reckon, you know, it is reckoned that the Irish learned a lesson. I hope they have because it did seem like, you know, things were as the Irish say, they lost the run of themselves and it was all about stages and it was all about accumulating properties and all the rest of it and going into huge debt. And I think people have learned that lesson, have just come from there. And there's a wonderful atmosphere. There's a, there's a small, very small minority, very small minority of people that are heading towards this far right anti immigrant action. Very, very, very noisy on, on social media. So it sounds like, you know, it's everywhere. It's not actually. I discovered it wasn't. But I think Ireland, I think they've learned the lesson from the Celtic Tiger. I think it was a pretty shallow place back then. You know, these are generalizations. Obviously not everyone was prone to that.
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A
If I were to make to you the counterintuitive claim that Northern Ireland feels like the real Ireland to me, does that make any sense to you whatsoever?
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Not really.
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A
To me it's the Ireland that is still pre modern in many of its parts. And the Republic is not other than maybe the west coast or parts of the deep South.
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B
No, not really. I don't think that's true. I mean it's doing less well economically, that's for sure. I mean, Southern Ireland is booming. You know, Ireland, Southern Ireland was never industrialized. So in a way we're catching up where, you know, we are. We were never industrialized. The north was. We suffered terrible recessions and unemployment in the 80s. I mean, I left Ireland in the 80s during that time. It was a terrible time. And what, what do we do? We, we educated ourselves. So we, we became possibly, you know, among the most educated populations on earth in that time.
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A
You're the most, I believe, number one.
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Yeah. So the north hasn't done that, I think, you know, of course people were going to college, but it wasn't a sort of, you know, it was a default almost for people in Ireland to go to college. There wasn't anywhere else to. There wasn't anything else to do. One, do this. And I think also there were. There were good decisions made by the government to offer. Offer education promoted. And, you know, that's why I think the south is booming now.
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A
You're old enough to have lived through the collapse of Catholic Church influence in Ireland. Did that shock you? It seems historically virtually unprecedented. Or was it somehow obvious that would be happening? And why was it so quick?
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B
I don't know. It was shocking. I mean, I wasn't living there when it was happening. I was following things somewhat. You know, I've said it. I've said it in one of the books. You know, it was like growing up in Taliban Ireland. When I grew up in the 60s in Dublin, the church had such power, and they abused that power in many ways, some terrible. So when it all started falling, you know, it's like the truth comes out. You know, when the truth comes out, it can be like a house of cards. So I suppose that's why it might have been sudden. But I guess if you're living there and you're really observing this, it was probably being chipped away at and people were just, you know, they knew things. People knew things. And it was permissible now to speak up about it and talk about it. And I mean, I think it's. It's the church that's fallen. I wouldn't say religion has gone necessarily, but I think the church has really suffered.
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A
Being a photographer and also filmmaker, do you think you see Irish history differently from that vantage point? And if so, how.
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B
You mean other people's history?
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A
Other people, you know, history of Ireland, the last, you know, say, since 1922?
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B
No, I don't think so. I don't think so. I think people. I think if you're interested in history, you're interested in history, you know, and you'll, you'll read around the subject and you'll draw parallels with. I find, though, that, you know, things I've done in Ireland, they do inform me when I go somewhere else. You know, I look at the history of other. But that's probably true of anyone. You know, you. You know, you look at you. What's relatable, you know, something happens to you or you learn something about your history, and then something's happening in Iran. Oh, that's interesting. You know, there's a. There's a kind of a parallel. There's, you know, we compare things all the time, don't we?
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A
When you left, why did you leave?
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B
I left. Well, one Reason was the recession. I also left because at the time it was a boring place for, for a 20 year old. It was a boring place. I might, you know, if it was now, I wouldn't be leaving. I would have stayed. It was, you know, a white, Catholic, poor country on the edge of Europe. And quite apart from that, I want, always wanted to travel. From an early age I wanted to travel. So a combination of all those things, you know, I was going to be moving. Whatever happened, even if things had been, had been going well, I think I would have wanted to taste what else is out there.
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A
And how was it that in the Ireland of that time you became a photographer?
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B
I didn't really become a photographer in Ireland. It wasn't until I went to America and I bought a camera and I had time and also there was a dark room near where I was living, a public darkroom and I was able to use that. I learned how to develop my black and white film and print it. And that was a huge, that was a huge factor, you know, to suddenly, to take a picture and then be able to control it afterwards and see it. Suddenly there was, there was a continuation, there was consistency, you know, something that you thought about, something you saw, something you wanted to capture. You could then see the result and you know, you learn from your mistakes and when you're printing you really see the mistakes. So it was really when I left, left Ireland that, that I, I learned photography.
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A
And what had been your job in Ireland?
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B
I was a student.
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A
So you never had like a proper career before being a photographer?
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B
No.
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A
And then you went to where in the United States?
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B
I went to New York and I went to San Francisco.
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A
What is it you wish Americans would understand about current Ireland? That maybe they do not. What's our biggest misconception?
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B
Ooh, I don't know really. It's too general a question really. I mean, you know, because everyone coming, people coming to London, they're going to have misconceptions. I don't know, I don't know. They get things that wrong. I mean, I, I don't think it's necessarily a quiz, you know, I think they, you know, they seem to love it. They can't all be sort of just searching for their roots. I think people love it. The atmosphere is great and things are so easy now with transportation and everything else. It's very expensive though, I have to say. It's much more expensive than it was.
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A
I think we regard the Irish as especially friendly. I'm not sure that's entirely wrong to Be clear. But we don't come away necessarily from England saying the same thing. And the more depressive side of the Irish personality is less apparent to visiting Americans. That would be my sense.
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B
Well, I think it's also, you know, anyone on holiday, they. They take away, you know, they're in a good mood. And, you know, if you're a tourist, you're probably spending money, so people are going to be, you know, they're going to be friendly to you. It's like, you know, just common decency, but also good service. You know, Irish people going to England, for example, will come back and say, oh, my God, the English are so friendly. You know, they're not like that. You know, they're much friendlier than we are. They're much more polite. And I think it's also what, you know. You know, like, you walk into a shop in Ireland and somebody will immediately maybe tell you a joke or. Or something, which is kind of unusual for you, but not usual for us. Not unusual for us. And then maybe that Irish person will go to England and going to a shop, and the person in the shop might be telling them some little bit of history or something, and because it's different. Oh, my God, that's so friendly. Yeah. When you're on holiday, you're looking to have a good time, you're in a good mood. So I think that has a huge effect.
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A
And now you're living in Calcutta, mainly?
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B
No, no, I'm living in London some of the year in Calcutta.
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A
And why Calcutta?
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B
My wife is Indian. She grew up in Delhi, Bombay and Calcutta. But Calcutta was her favorite, and they were the years that were her most formative years. She's got lots of friends from Calcutta. I love the city. I mean, she was saying that, you know, if I didn't like the city, then we wouldn't be. We wouldn't be spending as much time in Calcutta as we do. But I do love the city. It's got, you know, it's got, in many ways, everything I would look for in a city. And, you know, Kabul, in a way, was. Was a bit like Calcutta when times were better. And this is maybe a replacement for Kabul for me. But, you know, Calcutta is extraordinary. And it's, It's. It's got that history. It's got the buildings, the people are very. Bengalis are fascinating. It's got culture, fantastic food, the best.
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A
Sweets in India, right?
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B
Absolutely, absolutely.
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A
It's my daughter's favorite city in India.
- [27:20]
B
Really? Yeah. What does she like about it?
- [27:23]
A
There's a. A Kind of noir feel to it all.
- [27:26]
B
Absolutely.
- [27:28]
A
And it's so compelling and so strong and just grabs you and you feel it on every street, every block.
- [27:33]
B
Yeah.
- [27:34]
A
And it's probably still the most intellectual Indian city with the best bookshops. A certain kind of public intellectual life.
- [27:42]
B
Yes. I mean, and it's widespread. It's not just, you know, in an elite, it's, you know, everyone. We went to a book fair, huge book fair. I mean, you know, this is like, you know, you go there and it's like going to. I don't know what, it's like going to Kumbamela or something. It's extraordinary. And there's a huge tent right in the middle. And it's for what they call little magazines. And little magazines are these sort of very small publications run by one or two people. And they'll publish poetry, they'll publish interesting stories. Sadly, I don't speak Bengali because I'd love to be reading the stuff, but, you know, and there are hundreds of these things and they. They survive and people buy them. And so it's not just the elite, you know, it's extraordinary in that way.
- [28:24]
A
Is there any significant hardship associated with living there, say, a few months a year for us?
- [28:30]
B
No. No. I mean, there's a lot of pollution or. Yes, yes. And, you know, the biggest pollution for me is the noise. The noise? Yes, the honking horns. Jesus Christ. I mean, really, you want to rip those horns out of those cars because people don't use their horn for any particular reason, it seems. It just. It's like a heartbeat.
- [28:51]
A
What's the future of that city? Right. It hasn't grown as much as many other parts of India. It feels run down, which maybe is part of the charm, but it becomes a problem over time. It's de. Industrializing.
- [29:03]
B
Yeah. I mean, and somebody was saying, a writer I know who lives there was saying that the property development is all a kind of a scam in a way. What they're doing is. You're talking about noir. I did a project on the Art deco houses, homes in Calcutta. They're wonderful. They're usually people from East Bengal, middle class people, I suppose, you know, fleeing partition and. And the war in 71. And they, they came to Calcutta and they, they built their houses and they, they loved art deco. They loved the modernism of art deco. And each house is different. They are now being torn down to make way for flats. You know, apartments. Five story, three story, even. But the point is, it's flats. Whereas these buildings would have housed a Very extended family, maybe 20 people living in it now, they knock these down. And the reason is because the people living in Calcutta, if it's a family, you know, there's probably half the family are in Dubai. Other. Other people are in New York or London or Delhi or Bombay. And there's one person left or two people left, and the property developers are knocking the door saying, hey, listen, we'll give you this much money. They probably want to stay, but the other people living outside India want to cash in. They don't want to go back to the city. You know, it's not the future for them. So, I mean, in some ways, you could say it is slightly a dying city, but there is stuff going on. You know, there's a very thriving art scene. You do see shops opening all the time. There's new restaurants. So I don't know how it all works. They're not very happy with Modi. You know, they're unusual in that they're a very diverse city, and I think they pride themselves on that, which isn't really the Modi message. So you're right. It's not part of the thrusting new India and that. That is what its charm is for an outsider anyway, and for people living there. I know.
- [30:50]
A
Where else do you want to live?
- [30:52]
B
I love London. And the thing about is, I moved to London in 87, and I never thought of London as my home for many years because I was traveling a lot. It was a great base. But actually, over the years, I've. I've. And also London has improved. You know, London was. I mean, I've got photographs when I arrived in London, and it was a shabby place. You know, it was violent in many ways more violent than it is now. It was. It was a tough place. The edges have been. Have been surrounded out and. And, you know, food has got a lot better. Transport seems to have got better. Everything is more expensive and it's very difficult in that way. But, you know, it was a very shabby place when I came in 87, but it's really improved. And for me, it's really improved. So I love London. I could live in Dublin. I think I could live in Dublin. I'd be happy between London and Calcutta. That'll do.
- [31:42]
A
And then travel, which is your life, right?
- [31:44]
B
Yeah. And then travel. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I want to see more of India. That's the other thing. You know, being in. In Calcutta, it's. It's a gateway to not just India, but, you know, Southeast Asia. So, I mean, if I can Combine that with work. That would be the key.
- [31:58]
A
What do you think is the future of Syria? You've done work there, right?
- [32:02]
B
I don't.
- [32:03]
A
A lot has changed in the last year. Is there. Is there hope, or. Can you go there now?
- [32:09]
B
I think you can. I went there when I really shouldn't have gone there in 2012. It really looked like it was all over for Assad, and then Russia came in and helped them, and that was. You know, it went on for. You know, I think. I think I did a small little multimedia piece and I. I wrote the script saying that 5,000 people have been killed, you know, in 2012. I mean, what's the figure? What was the figure at the end of that war? And a wonderful people. I mean, I. I remember being in Syria in 2007, I think it was. I did a story for a magazine which was in Lebanon and Syria, and we went from Beirut. You could drive just across into Damascus, and it was like going from one planet to another. In many ways. People were so honest and friendly. I'm not saying the Lebanese are dishonest, but there was just a very different atmosphere and. And they were so friendly and just a lovely, lovely, lovely place. And, you know, even in 2012, when things were really tough, people were fantastic. So I. The future. I don't know. I really haven't been following it. The problem with me is that when I. When I stop doing work in a place, something else is taking my attention and I'm not very good at keeping up with. You know, if I was supposed to go to Syria in two days, I would, you know, I would read all I could and, you know, get myself informed. So I haven't really been very, very diligent in keeping up with Syria, I'm afraid.
- [33:31]
A
Is that the most danger you've been in? Or would you say Nigeria or somewhere else?
- [33:36]
B
Nigeria was very dangerous. Yeah. I mean, I was in two instances within hours of each other where I really thought I was going to be killed.
- [33:43]
A
Killed for what reason?
- [33:44]
B
For being a photographer. We basically ran into Boko Haram. Literally. Literally. I was photographing through the windscreen. I thought I was just going into a money market and I was photographing the currency exchanges and the driver didn't tell me, no, this is all Boko Haram, and that's what they do. And so suddenly they were trying to drag me out of the car. It was a horrible situation. I was with the same journalist, Eliza Griswold. We were very lucky to get out of that alive. And then.
- [34:12]
A
And how did you get out of it alive?
- [34:14]
B
We had a driver who was very, very sharp and very good, and he sort of tried to talk them down. It was a mob, and they dragged him out and they beat him up. They were after my camera is what they were after, because they thought I had something that was, you know, of value. In the end, I gave them a card, which wasn't the card that I'd been shooting the stuff on. Then there was a mullah who came and tried to calm everyone down, and he did. And then it all rose up again. The atmospherica became crazy. And then there was some kind of secret, like, security policeman who must have been shadowing us, must have been following us, because he stepped in. It took him a long time to, you know, with showing credentials and all the rest of it. They were really out for blood. And then a few hours later, I was photographing on a bridge and people I thought it was safe to photograph on this bridge. There were people living down below the bridge. But what happened was people were climbing up the. The columns of the bridge and came running after me. And I had to literally run. The car was driving and I had to run, open up the car and jump in and take off.
- [35:18]
A
Like in the movies.
- [35:20]
B
Like in the movies, yeah.
- [35:21]
A
So you can actually do that. You can chase a moving car and open the door and jump in. It works well.
- [35:26]
B
I had to. I literally. First of all, it was the window. The window was open. I threw my camera in the window and then I grabbed the door open and I. Yeah, the guy was, you know, he was driving slowly enough that I could keep up with him, but fast enough that if things got. Got troublesome, he could. He could lose the crowd behind me.
- [35:41]
A
If I were to say that Michigan is, for me, the American state, most like Russia, visually. Do you agree?
- [35:48]
B
Looks. Looks like it, yeah. Yeah, yeah, I could see that. I could see that.
- [35:53]
A
What else struck you as similarities visually between the US and Russia?
- [35:57]
B
People. People's behavior. There's a kind of grandness to both places, you know, even in the design of things. I mean, you know, you look at things like, well, telephone boxes, we don't really have them anymore, you know, payphones. But the American payphone, you know, I don't think it changed in decades. Whereas payphones in the rest of the world, you know, they changed every few years, redesigned. So there's a kind of a. There's a kind of a staple design. Solid. And I guess it's industrial. There's an industrial, you know, similarity between the two countries. Things Are built to last.
- [36:32]
A
And what led you to do a book on the visual similarities between America and Russia?
- [36:36]
B
Well, I'd been working on a project on America for a number of years, and I wanted to. First of all, I wanted to do a book that was going to be in time for the 50th anniversary of on the Road, the Jack Kerouac book. I thought if I did a book on America now, that'd be a good thing. By the time 2007 came around, when. Which is when the anniversary was, I still wanted to go. I want. There was more I wanted to do. So I kept going. And then 2008, I was commissioned to go to the Russian Far east and photograph the country and the. And the. And the life, you know, behind this huge economic boom. All the. All the energy resources, but, you know, really about the people and what life is like. And that's where the idea struck me that, you know, this is not huge, of course, it's very different, but it's, you know, there's many, many similarities. And. And I thought that was a very interesting conceit. You know, we're told that we've got. We've got fatal enemies, you know, we've got natural enemies, and yet people from both places could be. They could be in either country, they could be. They could be each other at times. And I thought that was an interesting idea. And I. You know, this idea, it was just an idea at that stage. And then I continued to work on things in America. I got involved in filmmaking. I met PJ Harvey, and we. We had a few projects that kind of took me away from the project. And then Trump started coming and making noises about Putin, and there was this sort of bromance. And I thought, this is very interesting. This is this old, old, old idea I had of similarities. And I decided I'd go back to Russia and see if I could do some work there. So I went back in 2017 and 2019, I went back to the Urals because the Urals was the closest I could find to an equivalent, in a way. So the Urals are an industrial area. I'd done quite a lot of work in the Pittsburgh area, Pennsylvania. So I thought that was. That was a fair. A fair comparison, but really, you know, as a photographer, I'm photographing people all the time. It's people, it's what they're doing. It's their relationships with each other. It's the funny things they do. It's the funny things that I see. It's the beauty that I see how people struggle. You know, that's what I'm after. And, you know, it's very easy to come up with themes when you're looking at pictures you shot. But if you were to go out with a theme in your head, it'd be quite, quite, quite restricting in some ways. I think the photographs wouldn't be as interesting for me anyway. So I like that spontaneity. So you come back and you look at the pictures and then you start putting together the themes. The themes present themselves. Themes perhaps you hadn't even thought about. I mean, right down to the very last days of putting the book together. You know, this was a many, many years project. There were pictures that were always going to be in the edit, you know, always got to be. And there's no way they were going to come out. And they came out because they had to make room for this other picture that I found. So it's a very fluid practice and, you know, it's a great practice. I love it. I love putting work together like that, you know, sequencing it, editing it. These two pictures give you a certain mood, certain feeling, certain meaning, you know, at one stage, I had 136 pictures in the book that was going to be. And I couldn't imagine taking anything out. And then over time, I started really going into the work, and I ended up with 88 pictures, you know, and by doing that, I was changing the meaning of the book. I was. I was making it lighter in some ways. So it's a great process. I love it.
- [40:03]
A
Why don't Russians smile more? Or do you think they do?
- [40:06]
B
I think they. I think they. I. I don't think they're as serious as, you know, I mean, I. When I came back from that trip in 2008, it was for a magazine called Dispatches, and I wrote a little piece and I said something like, serious people make me laugh. Very serious people make me laugh a lot. And Russians are the most serious people I've ever met. So they made me laugh a lot. And I think what it is is that they have this very dark sense of humor. Again, very like the Irish. There's a dark sense of humor, and I think that they'll crack a joke, but they won't smile, and that's part of the joke. And it's also like, you know, you don't even know it's a joke, and that's the humor.
- [40:47]
A
My wife grew up in the Soviet Union, and she has the basic view that people who smile too much are idiots.
- [40:53]
B
Yeah, yeah. But, you know, they say that, but.
- [40:56]
A
She and all her friends, they have excellent senses of humor.
- [40:59]
B
Yes. Yeah, I know.
- [41:01]
A
Great storytellers.
- [41:02]
B
Yeah. Yeah, it's true, you know, but they haven't there been studies done that if you smile a lot, you actually, it makes you feel better. So maybe that's. Right. Maybe it's a good thing. Maybe it's a good thing to smile. But, but yeah, there is this, there is this sort of moody, you know, almost like, you know, Jean Paul Sarge, existential, you know, quizzing everything and, you know, why smile? Sort of thing. I don't know.
- [41:28]
A
Did you visit Magnitogorsk in the Urals?
- [41:31]
B
No. No.
- [41:32]
A
Do people in the Urals seem happy to you or what's. It's a complex question, but what's your sense of the actual living standard?
- [41:39]
B
I mean, you know, what I saw, there were rich and poor, you know, and there were people in the middle. You know, I, I don't think that people were happy with the regime. A lot of the people that I was hanging out with were not happy with the regime for sure. And that was before the Ukraine war. It's corruption. You know, things are, things are tough. But, you know, they have their, their dachas, they have, they eat quite well. I think they read a lot. Again, huge generalizations, I'm afraid it's a huge country, but I think, I think people are as happy as anywhere else. We know what I saw. You know, people in London complain a lot. People in Param complain a lot, but they're also very happy.
- [42:12]
A
What was your role in the PJ Harvey album Let England Shake?
- [42:16]
B
Well, that was an interesting one, because I, I, I done a book out of Afghanistan in 2008, and Polly had seen the exhibition in London and she bought the book and she got in touch and was interested in meeting me and, and talking about that. And, and at that stage, she'd been writing the book. Sorry. She'd been writing the songs and she'd done a demo. So really she'd already done all the work. I think some of my work might have influenced her in some way. Looking at pictures from Afghanistan, because she wrote about the First World War, she wrote about Iraq, she wrote about Afghanistan, and she wrote about England. That was Letting the Shake. So I came back from Afghanistan actually having shot some video for the first time, and she said, oh, you shoot video too? Would you like to make some music films for me? And I said, sure. So that was what I ended up doing. She gave me the demo. It wasn't an album at that stage. And I put together an idea which was, first of all, I was gonna go to Iraq and Afghanistan to shoot these music films in those places, because these places were being referenced so much in the songs. And then I thought, actually, stay in England. It's called Let England Shake. Stay in England and find some kind of equivalent, visual equivalent of that legacy, that legacy of colonies and colonialism of the first World War, and find it in the English people and find it in the cities and the countryside. So I ended up doing this road trip around England twice, and I shot a lot of video and I put it together, and I made 12 short films for that album. So it was making music films for that album.
- [43:56]
A
And those are on your website, right?
- [43:58]
B
They're on the website, yeah. And the next. The next project, we thought that worked very well. And the next project, we decided what we'd do is we would actually start that project at the same time. So I would be photographing and filming, and she would be taking notes, writing poetry and songs, and we do some traveling together. And that ended up becoming hopesaked Demolition project. That was the name of the album. Yeah.
- [44:22]
A
Do you think you. And she saw something about England back then that was ahead of its time?
- [44:28]
B
I think she did. I think she did.
- [44:30]
A
And what was that?
- [44:31]
B
Well, it was Brexit, wasn't it? I mean, in its simplest form, it was Brexit. Goddamn Europeans is what is one of the songs that starts out. You know, it's some person being quoted. I mean, or she's written the lyric goddamn Europeans. So I guess it was tapping into some kind of patriotism, nationalism.
- [44:51]
A
And the further album, Hope 6 Demolition Project that came out of trips to Kosovo and Washington. Am I understanding this correctly?
- [44:58]
B
Trips to Washington. Afghanistan. Yes, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Washington, D.C. we'd sort of decided we'd like to travel together and see where things would take us. And the promise to each other was like, you know, if. If. If we did this once and it just didn't work, we. That's fine. We wouldn't do it. But we. We were invited to Kosovo to a very good film festival called the Do Fest in prison. And they wanted us to do a Q and A based on my 12 short films for Lenning L. Shake. So I'd been to Kosovo during the war, and she'd already started writing some stuff actually, based on some of my pictures. So we went and we thought, okay, we'll go on this and maybe we should start. This could be the start of the travels. And the Balkans are a Fascinating place to go to, and Kosovo is at peace, but very, very interesting and very, very, very warm people. And so we spent a few days in Kosovo, and we discovered that we could travel together and we could actually produce work. And we were sort of up and running. And then I was. A year later, I was in Afghanistan working on that poetry project, the Afghan Women's Poetry Project, and book and film. And it was quiet there. It was 2012. I finished my work there. It was December, Very good situation with a very nice place to live, a good driver that I trusted, and I just offered, would she like to come and visit Afghanistan? But didn't know what. Whether she would or not. And in the end, she did, and we did that. And that was pretty extraordinary because I think what she wrote about Afghanistan was so unique. You know, it's a very different take. I'd never read anything like what she was writing about Afghanistan.
- [46:34]
A
And how would you characterize that?
- [46:36]
B
An artist's eye. I mean, a true artist's vision. You know, small little things becoming a whole song. And then in her own interval way, you know, she was. She was capturing that. And I think the country was. You know, it was great to do that with Afghanistan because, you know, as you were saying about photography and what people's perceptions are of the country, I thought this would bring a slightly different take on the place for people that would listen.
- [47:01]
A
Do you have a PJ Harvey story that you're able to tell us?
- [47:04]
B
Well, funnily enough, yes. No. The thing. That's. The thing that comes to mind is the weirdest story is when we were coming back from Afghanistan, Turkish Airlines. So we had our trip and we went to the Panchira Valley and we had a few little scrapes, but nothing, because there weren't any. There weren't any Taliban there at that time. I mean, there were, but they were in other places. We didn't go to those places. So it was. It was fairly uneventful. But, you know, there was always. There was always the possibility of something happening. And so, you know, job done. And we were flying from Kabul to London, and literally, we were just about to land. I mean, literally, the. The wheels are down and the engines were roared into action and we took off. And I just turned up and I said, jesus, I hope you're not being kidnapped or something. This is very strange. And we flew around for about half an hour. Nobody said a word. Nobody came on the. I mean, everyone was freaked out. People in the. The airplane were looking for some kind of guidance as to what was going on. Obviously the people that were. The. The staff were kind of all seated. So that was very strange, Very strange. Thought. I just thought, you know, what's. What's going on here?
- [48:13]
A
She was very calm and what was going on?
- [48:16]
B
Don't know. To this day, I don't know. Got off the plane, was happy to be on terra firma and that was the end of it. Forgot about it. I just thought about it right now.
- [48:23]
A
Now, if you meet a young person and that person wants to be, you know, some modified version of what you have done. So photography, possibly something with cinema, multimedia projects, working with music, of course they should work hard, they should be smart. But what are the traits you would look for in them to judge whether or not that was possible for them to do?
- [48:47]
B
I think it would not be a technical thing. I mean, I think, you know, people can learn technical stuff very quickly and that technology is so kind of accessible. I think it's themselves, I think it's their interests, I think it's their curiosity. I think it's a very tough field to get into. It's very competitive. It's changed so much since I started doing it. But that actually they could handle because they grew up with the technology and the way things are, so that wouldn't be a problem for them. But I think it's really to do it and to do it properly and to have a proper career in it and spend. Spend the time you'd need. You really have to be interested in what you're talking about. You have to have a curiosity, you have to have a real interest and a love of it, whether it's the photography, whether it's the politics, whether it's the environment, you know, whatever the subject is. And you should always do work that you love. I mean, of course you'll have to do work that you don't love, to make a living and to get on and pay bills. But projects that you take on that take time, take a lot of energy, and many times you think it's going to be a failure and nothing will ever come of it. You have to love what you're doing, you have to have an interest. So I think that would be the biggest advice. Follow the things that you love and find a way to make it work.
- [49:59]
A
Do you feel there was a point in your career when you didn't do that, or you think you've just executed on that consistently?
- [50:06]
B
I definitely did it. It was a period towards the beginning when I was working a lot for a Swedish newspaper and they were very Good pay and they were lovely people. I was traveling around England for them and I don't resent doing it and I'm very happy I did it. And economically it was very stabilizing for me. But I spent quite a lot of time doing that and I needed to do that because I needed to pay the bills. I wasn't independently wealthy. But then when I did get the chance to do some traveling and do the work that I really wanted to do, it was, you know, it was another reality. It would be nice to have done that work earlier, but, you know, that's the way it goes.
- [50:42]
A
And what do you see as having been your big breakthrough, so to speak?
- [50:45]
B
Biggest breakthrough was the first piece I had published in England, which was about young working class kids in Dublin having ponies in their back gardens. You know, in urban areas, inner city areas where they would normally have cats and dogs, they had horses. And I came across this having come back from America. I saw this kid on horseback, bareback, walking past me in this urban estate. I thought, that's really strange. But then again, I'd seen that I'd grown up with this. I knew it. But having come from the outside, this was something that was very unusual for my eyes. So I followed that and I found out that there was a horse market every month that these kids were going to and they would have races and they would buy and sell ponies. And I went to their homes and, and I saw, you know, how they looked after the ponies. And I did that story. And that story was the first story I published in England. And that was the break that was suddenly. That was when the Swedish newspaper saw that story and wanted me to go to Ireland with them to shoot it in color. And that was the breakthrough. After that, I was off the races, as they say.
- [51:47]
A
Two final questions. First, if our listeners want to consume more of you, where would you send them?
- [51:54]
B
I suppose my website, you know, seamusmurphy.com I'm very proud of the book that I've just come out with, you know, Strange Love. It was a very, very long, a very long process and I think it's very relevant to the world today. And I think it's probably my best work. So.
- [52:08]
A
And that's the visual comparison of America and Russia, American Russia, which I very much quite liked, to be clear, very much quite like. And I gave a copy to my wife who will.
- [52:16]
B
Oh, did you. What did she, what did she make of it?
- [52:19]
A
She hasn't looked at it yet, but.
- [52:20]
B
She will smile at all.
- [52:22]
A
She smiles like An American. This, to me, is quite striking, you know, of the Soviet women who come over. Whether or not you marry an American, I think is such an amazing predictor of your smiling behavior 20 years later. I'm not saying they're happier, but they do smile much more.
- [52:38]
B
Right, Right. Good.
- [52:39]
A
Last question. What will you do next?
- [52:42]
B
Well, I'm in the process of developing a film about a family that I met in Kabul in 1994. First time I was there, I stayed with them in. In this frontline area in the old city. And there were four sons and a father, and I photographed them. And then two years later, the Taliban came. And I managed to get down to see them, just to see how they were doing, and I arranged to meet them somewhere else because I met them in their home. It might have been dangerous for them. And I. I found them, and two of them had been killed by the Taliban. And I did a photograph again of. Of the family, and that every time I went to Afghanistan, I would check in with them and see what was going on, and I would take some pictures. And that developed into a very long project. It's 30. Over 30 years now of photographs. And there's two left. The two. Two sons. The two youngest sons are still living. One is living in Turkey and one is living in Germany. So none of the family are alive. Most of them were killed during the war. In the war. One of the boys that I'd met in. In 1994 had already lost one leg. He's living in Turkey. He's got seven children. The other is living in Germany with five children. And I'm making a film about them, and I'm developing that at the moment with. With a producer in Ireland. So that's. That's one thing. Yeah. And then there's always other things I'm doing. I'm going back to Ireland. I've just come from Ireland. There's a couple of ideas that. That I was researching, and I'm. I'm. I'm trying to put them into practice. So. Yeah.
- [54:05]
A
Seamus Murphy, thank you very much.
- [54:07]
B
Thank you very much.
- [54:12]
A
Thanks for listening to Conversations with Tyler. You can subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. If you like this podcast, please consider giving us a rating and leaving a review. This helps other listeners find the show on Twitter. I'm TylerCowen and the show is Owen Convos. Until next time, Please keep listening and learning.