Pop Sonality Conversation with Martin Salter.

Pop Sonality had the privilege to discuss with one of the best photographers in the world right now: Martin Salter. Truly. In this conversation, he opened his soul as a creator to talk about his main subjects: the British identity, his trips, people, places, and the engaging nostalgia that surrounds all of them. We learned about his concepts of freedom and his obsession with the passing of time. Martin also revealed his schemes for composition and priorities when shooting. Instagram positioned his work under the spotlight, and now he is willing to find a balanced connection with this network. Read this insightful and deep portrait of this memorable photographer, and discover his future moves.

Inside your gallery of British Subjects, there is a series entitled “Memory Lane” with your square signature format, full of different and special personalities of people and places. The pastel and vintage tones and colors are already associated with your style and works. Though these photographs were taken in the 1990s and 2000s, most of them have a timeless touch, reinforced with a genuine enigmatic effect on viewers. You leave this sensation on us wondering what was happening and who these people were.

What do you recall from these moments?

The images from Memory Lane were made at a time of immense personal freedom. I had the time to devote to going out to shoot and make work whenever I chose. There was also money available from magazines at that time to fund some of the projects I worked on which made this time both creatively rewarding and helped to sustain my young family. I discovered a new way of working has moved away from black and white reportage-style imagery and more exotic subjects to focus primarily on the UK and shooting in medium format color. I would choose a subject or a theme and work hard at gathering the images to create a series. This could be done over a number of weeks and months or in a single day or weekend. I worked on around 30 different projects between 1995 and 2005 and many of these were published at the time. Series included Ascot, Bar Culture, Skateboarding, the High Street, The English Seaside, Outdoor Lidos, California UK, etc. I did shoot some work abroad – most notably in LA at Venice Beach and Miami along Collins Avenue as well as some small projects whilst on holiday in Europe – mostly focusing on beach culture.

Can you remember these people and places in your memory lane?

I can vividly remember all of the shoots as they were pretty much an extension of myself. These were not projects which had been imposed on me that I had to become interested in. They were subjects I had chosen to devote time and energy to and so I was very much involved in them. This time of my life was a rich creative vein that I tapped with great enthusiasm and joy. It is often described as a photographer’s Golden Period – a time of very prolific output which is unconscious and untouched by self-doubt. The work just pours out of you because you really have no way of stopping it.

Your series “On the Edge” brings very unusual compositions, with a riskier approach. The eyes revolve around the square format looking for the focus and moving around, projecting arrows, in circles, up and down, from side to side. Most of them take advantage of depth getting a lovely output.

How does your mind work in terms of composition?

I see the world in 2D when I have my camera with me. This can be tiring for those around me which is why I always work alone. I see the different planes and see how they could all come together in a flat image on the ground glass screen of my Rolleiflex camera. It is very much a case of understanding how slight movements from left to right, up and down can affect the image. Understanding parallax and shifting your body to work with this is what makes good photography. And patience. Waiting for all the elements to come together – foreground, middle ground, background. I don’t shoot many images of the same subject. Maybe 3 at the most. The film is expensive and I like to work very frugally. It is a challenge too. If I don’t get the image then it’s kind of my fault for not thinking about it carefully enough. There are thousands and thousands of images I don’t bother to take anymore. I simply don’t need them. I shoot around 60 rolls of film a year – that’s about 720 photos. From this, I usually have a hit rate of around 30%. That’s a lot of photos. Maybe 5 or 10 are really good. The rest I like a lot. I don’t seek perfection but I do think you need to think very carefully about how you shoot, what you shoot, and why you are shooting it in the first place!

Is the positioning of the elements an important part of your decisions when shooting?

It is absolutely essential. This is not the case for some more expressionistic photographers but I would openly admit my working practice is rooted in the aesthetics of modernism – starting with the forms of the early Bauhaus photographers and the classicists such as Cartier Bresson. I have a great love of the more fluid photographers – Klein and Winogrand being key examples but ultimately if all the elements are in place I am happy. This could be a need for control, to make the world fit my way of framing – but hey – that’s why I take photographs. Otherwise, it would just be looking and you don’t need a camera for that. Perhaps one day I will achieve the greatest prize of all – being able to go into the world and just see. Unfortunately, no one else will get to look at the inside of my brain so I will carry on sharing through photography until that day happens.

Which are your priorities? You've been working all around the UK, urban, countryside, and coast, is there any special town or village you feel that you are more inspired by?

I am drawn to the coast these days because I am trying to complete a long-term project. Also, the light and space are fantastic in most coastal locations. But once that project is finished I am going to stop shooting this subject matter. I have purchased a Graflex RB Super D SLR camera. It was built in the 1940s and works like a giant 5X4 Rolleiflex. I will shoot black and white sheet film and shoot even fewer photographs than I am currently shooting now. Maybe get it down to a few hundred a year. I will be asking for consent for every image I make and perhaps begin to explore subjects in more detail. I am very interested in people who do good things in the face of unbelievable challenges so might turn my attention to this as a subject. I am also going to travel less with my camera and work more locally. We shall see.

There is some tension in your gallery from Mexico and Central America. Maybe the use of black and white brings this sensation. The composition is still quite yours though.

How do you remember this trip?

I traveled through Mexico and Central America with my wife in 1993. I think we both knew it was going to be our last long trip before we settled down and had a family. We had also both been at work for the past 5 years so it felt great to break out and hit the road. I shot 35mm Kodachrome on Leica SLRs and black and white on a Mamiya C330s. The color work was my attempt to emulate one of my favorite photographers at the time – Alex Webb. I managed to make many Webb-style images but ultimately he owns that approach. I found the square format black and white quieter, and more thoughtful and began to see the first signs of where things might go when I got back to the UK. I was still looking for the exotic, the “otherness” which is something all photographers have a tendency to do although that is becoming less and less relevant as the world becomes more homogenized. I was aware of the work of the color documentarists of the time but didn’t have the courage to fully embrace what they had been teaching us – the ordinary is as extraordinary as the exotic. Focus on that. When I returned to the UK I was happy with what I had produced but realized I still had yet to find my own voice. After a brief stint working in the editorial team at Magnum on my return, I decided to try and make a go of it as a freelancer and have been doing so ever since. This is my 29^th year of freelancing.

Any place you would like to visit in the near future for a photo project?

I would like to complete the work I have made in Zanskar and Ladakh – the Himalayan region in North West India I have visited many times over the past 35 years both as a photographer and a filmmaker. I will be including archive material from other people in this and new work by local creatives. It’s ongoing but I hope to complete that this year. I also want to start working in Black and White again and am exploring ways to do this. I am struggling to remain as excited by photography as I was and after discovering the challenges of making films I am looking at maybe simplifying everything and exploring poetry as a new expressive and creative form. I have always written poems and find them incredibly visual in a strange way. They can combine emotions with images in my head which is something that is very very hard to do with a single photograph.

What are your next moves in photography?

Black and White. Graflex RB Super D once I have completed the outstanding projects on the coast and Zanskar. I am trying to reduce the amount I do in order to make more time for others and for just being in the world. I realize I have been far too driven in life which has caused its own problems. I have nothing to prove anymore and the idea of achieving and striving at my age seems unnecessary. I would just like to be more in tune with the world I live in -photography has hugely helped with this but it also creates a barrier between you and direct experience. I would like to meditate as much as I photograph. I have been putting this off for over 30 years and it is time I just sat still and followed my breath for a time. With nothing to gain. Maybe this will help with my next project. Maybe not. That’s OK.

"With fresh eyes, you can see new things" you shared on a beautiful portrait of a couple and their dog on the Mablethorpe seafront. It seems you understand your art as an evolving form that can change through time depending on your current vision and perspective. Like if you could come back to your old materials and find what you missed in the past. You also contrast past and present frequently, this comparison I think enriches your artist statements.

What does a photo from your archive have to tell you to rescue it and share it with the world now?

I think I was sharing all I had that I was happy with. I think there are about 2500 images I would consider worthy of sharing. Of these, there are probably 50 great images. That is a great success for any photographer. Memory Lane has some of the greats but there are others in different formats and styles. I decided to share spontaneously as I rediscovered the work. However, I have realized that I have become too reliant on Instagram for my daily affirmation which has not always been a good thing. I feel like I have to post to keep an audience engaged. I realize now that the algorithm on Instagram does not really allow me to reach people in the way I would like so I am going to focus on my website now and share series and archives on this platform going forwards. If people would like to stop by that is great.

Do you consider yourself a nostalgic person?

I have been obsessed with the passing of time since I was a child. I grew up in the 1970s which was only 25 years after the end of the second world war. The war was still very much present – in TV, media, and films – it was around you in the grandparents who had lived through it and the parents who were born into it. Memory Lane hugely references these feelings. Nostalgia has been a yearning for home – which is what sadly led to Brexit. A yearning for some past that people thought was better and which most definitely was not. So I am not nostalgic. I do not yearn for these better times. Having said that I have always been aware of mortality as my father was very ill when I was a teenager so felt that photography was a great way of stopping time – on one level it is. On another level, it frustrates all attempts to contain time. I have a huge photobook collection which is basically a repository of moments in time. I like to look at these moments and wonder what it was really like to live in these places at that time. I have kind of been a hoarder of time – keeping it to myself and photography is part of that. I want to let go of all nostalgic yearnings for the past and any attempts to hang onto time. This way I will be more present and more aware of what the reality is right here and now. I find this Zen approach to life has clear parallels with photography – focusing intently on key moments in time. But it is not really the same at all. Photography is a telic activity – it has a goal, to make a photograph. I would like to engage in more ‘atelic’ activities – be less goal-driven which may help with my photography and turn it in a whole new direction. It may slow me down to the pace which feels comfortable for my time of life.

What does the past mean for you?

There is a sense of no effort or pushing in your photography, the images seem all to be quite natural like real-life people were part of your cinematic scenes and locations. And at the same time, the softness you achieve in your films is absolutely magnificent.

How do you manage to see the world so unaffected?

I am entirely affected by my need to see the world as I see it. I think others see that affectation. They either like it or they don’t. Artless art is what we all want to achieve as photographers. My advice is – do your own thing. Don’t worry about what others are doing but if you find you are doing your thing to keep others happy then do something else. Try something new otherwise, you are destined to become stale. This is something I am very aware of and want to address going, forward.

Does it require effort to look effortless?

If it does then I am not aware of it. When you are making work you are drawing on the whole history of photography, the whole history of where you are photographing, and the whole history of your inner life. If you can successfully merge all of these and make an image that resonates with others you have basically succeeded. You have become the alchemist. You have turned lead into gold.

It is curious that your portraits in India are not that different from those you take in the UK, with the same easiness and calmness from people. All the subjects seem to be calm and quiet like time stood still. It is also another characteristic I found in your gallery.

Are you conscious of those sensations you convey in the portraits?

I am a very energized and frenetic person. I crave calmness. It always evades me. Perhaps that is why I try and photograph it. I have taken manic photos, many times.

How do you approach people to photograph them?

The best thing to do is to introduce yourself, tell someone what you are doing and why you are doing it, and ask them if they would be interested in helping you do that. If you just want a cheap shot or a picture of someone looking odd then you have to really question what you are doing, why you are doing it, and why you would want someone to agree to be involved. Beware the cheap shot.

I've been reading your Instagram posts for a while now. You describe with detail the moments, reasons why, anecdotes, moral issues about privacy, comparisons about times, and descriptive texts about each image, which makes it an entertaining ride through your gallery.

How is your relationship with social networks and how does its feedback influence your work, your work process, and your approach to your work?

Instagram has been a wonderful way of sharing my work and interacting with people on a daily basis. It is how we met. However, it must be treated with caution if you have a personality like mine. I have recognized I have spent a little too long on the platform and am going to scale that back. I am genuinely interested in what others are doing and how they are going about things but I find it overwhelming. I think I will post less often now which will be hard as I love the interactions. It can take over though. Hopefully, I will find a balance. It is something I need to address and will ultimately lead me to the place of serenity I have been craving all my life. I hope all of the above has been of interest.

We hope you find that place of peace inside you, and keep on building your absolutely stunning visual legacy. Proud to have featured you, and have you onboard in the blog. 

You have the Pop Sonality!

* Prints and book are available from his website. All sales help fund his work.