The A1 road for those who know it, or know the book, doesn’t exactly conjure up thoughts of a road trip or road trip aesthetic. There are no dessert vista’s here, no vast stretches of road ahead and behind. This is most certainly not the orange-tinted views of Wim Wenders or Stephen Shore as they pass through El Passo and Nevada, neither does it evoke thoughts of Kerouac or Pirsig’s prose.
This isn’t to say we do not recognize some of the conventions of the genre in the images, particularly in the diners, cafes and petrol stations, but Graham has also weaved a decidedly British streak into the book. Bright blue skies give way to overcast days and wet roads, neon is only seen once, and all in all, this is a much more subdued photographic approach. No fanfare will be found here, just a well paced, expertly edited series of images, and in this I find myself looking harder, and for longer.
What lies at the heart of this book (to myself at least) and does conform to the road genre is the human encounters Graham has documented along the A1. These are all characters we recognise, they are the hundred of people we see in the car alongside, or in the adjacent cubicle at a restaurant and if you are anything like me, you wonder about why they are here, now, or what it is they do and why they do it. Almost all of the subjects in ‘A1’ hold the camera’s gaze back, I like to think they are looking at Graham, or at me, wondering exactly the same things.
Interestingly, while we see life from the road, cafe’s and fields going by, even pulling up to a petrol station, we are never inside the car. It is at first an odd omission, especially compared to the more well known photography from the US dealing with the road, it’s landscape and it’s stories. But in doing so Graham remains very much a traditional documentarian, slightly removed from each situation he encounters unlike his Stateside contemporaries. The result is another reason this is such an important and unique piece in the ever expanding road photography genre.
– Matt
And if you haven’t seen the book yet…