Bringing street photography to life by creating fiction from photos
- Text by Millie Morris
- Photography by Stephen Leslie
Are you an avid people-watcher? Do you like to sit and watch the world go by, wondering where people are marching off to, getting lost in the mystery of their lives?
Stephen Leslie does – and he’s created a whole book which offers back stories to the passing characters and fleeting glimpses of lives we see on the street.
With Stephen’s background ranging from directing and screenwriting to photography, it is easy to see how SPARKS came to fruition. Combining the weird and the whimsical, it promises a comic insight into imagined lives by taking inspiration from photographs he’s taken– resulting in short stories and new worlds.
“Street photography means that every time I leave the house I haven’t got a clue what I might end up photographing and I love that,” says Stephen, who has been taking photos for over two decades. “Gradually I came to appreciate that many of my favourite shots were suggestive, they acted as the starting point or ‘spark’ for an extended narrative”, he continues. Five years ago he decided to start writing short fictional stories to accompany his real life shots.
Thus became SPARKS. “My career as a screenwriter means I’m always thinking about characters and interesting narrative situations, and I’m very fortunate that I’ve now found a way to combine that with my photography,” Stephen says.
Extending a tradition which spans history – from William Blake’s poetry and illustrations to the picture books we read as children – Stephen finds photography an instantly gratifying antidote to the world of film-making, and the perfect complement to written words.
As his website explains, SPARKS aims to “match photographs with convincing lies that complement and, even possibly, explain the images.” This emphasis on photography offering a portal to “truth” has led Stephen to reconsider whether or not pictures snapped on the street really do this, or instead provide a misleading relationship with reality.
“Street photography gains a lot of its power by taking images out of context. When I take photographs I don’t really know what’s going on – I rarely interact with my subjects and neither does the viewer,” he says. “So now what I’m doing is providing fake contexts for my supposedly ‘real’ images and I enjoy the new, hybrid thing that this creates.”
From the lonely tale of Mr Biscuits the dog on a blind date to the unpredictable actions of a chiropodist who fantasises about becoming a pirate, the stories are amusing, longing, delightful and absurd. Revisiting one of the photographs after reading its pretend back story forces the reader to think twice about their original perception of the picture, colouring it in a very different light – and there lies the joy of the combination.
Exploring new realms of the age-old relationship between literature and art, Stephen Leslie is bringing still images to life, whipping up a whole new world in the process.
You can pledge to SPARKS now.
Enjoyed this article? Like Huck on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.
You might like
“I didn’t care if I got sacked”: Sleazenation’s Scott King in conversation with Radge’s Meg McWilliams
Radgenation — For our 20th Anniversary Issue, Huck’s editor Josh Jones sits down with the legendary art director and the founder of a new magazine from England’s northeast to talk about taking risks, crafting singular covers and disrupting the middle class dominance of the creative industries.
Written by: Josh Jones
Free-spirited, otherworldly portraits of Mexico City’s queer youth
Birds — Pieter Henket’s new collaborative photobook creates a stage for CDMX’s LGBTQ+ community to express themselves without limitations, styling themselves with wild outfits that subvert gender and tradition.
Written by: Isaac Muk
The suave style and subtle codes of gay San Francisco in the ’70s
Seminal Works — Hal Fischer’s new photobook explores the photographer’s archive, in which he documented the street fashion and culture of the city post-Gay Liberation, and pre-AIDS pandemic.
Written by: Miss Rosen
The stripped, DIY experimentalism of SHOOT zine
Zine Scene — Conceived by photographer Paul Mpagi Sepuya in the ’00s, the publication’s photos injected vulnerability into gay portraiture, and provided a window into the characters of the Brooklyn arts scene. A new photobook collates work made across its seven issues.
Written by: Miss Rosen
The heady bliss of Glastonbury Festival after the music
Not Done Yet — While the weekend’s headliners and stacked line-ups usually draws the majority of the attention, much of its magic occurs after the music stops. Mischa Haller’s new photobook captures the euphoria and endless possibilities of Glasto’s “in between” moments.
Written by: Isaac Muk
Confronting America’s history of violence against student protest
Through A Mirror, Darkly — In May 1970, two separate massacres at American college campuses saw deaths at the hands of the state. Naeem Mohaiemen’s new three-channel film memorialises the brutality.
Written by: Miss Rosen
