I am alone with the beating of my heart

Richard Hall

I am alone with the beating of my heart

with

a poem by Laura Turner

Vanishing

It stretches out, this thing we call a life; we feel it reach around us, tendrils pushing into that open, vast unknown. The strange uncertainty of not knowing what might lie ahead: a place we haven’t seen before that feels a thousand miles apart, yet calls to us. It sparks sensation, brittle deep inside of us: echoes and half whispers from another life. And in that instant, softly, silently, you are entirely alone, confronted by the shapes of other lives you wish you’d lived. But now, too late, you’re left with aching trenches of unfinished thoughts: memories buried in moments washed mute with rain, white with sun. Dreams and hopes that thrive inside the flood of night but vanish, silent, unremembered, and die in cold dawn light.

poem by Laura Turner

About the work

This book was made in response to, and in the shadow of the 2020 worldwide pandemic. It is inspired by the narrative storytelling images of Todd Hido and Alec Soth and is presented as a sort of paper movie.

I made a number of landscape and house images and sent these along with a quote from the 14th Century Chinese poet Lui Chi, ‘I am alone with the beating of my heart’ to Laura Turner. I asked Laura to write her poem based on the images and the line from Lui Chi. The poem Vanishing was given to the models Natalia and Lucy on which to base their characterisation for the piece.

Having viewed the images and read the poem I would invite you the viewer to look again at the images in light of having read the poem.

Laura Turner

Laura is a playwright, poet and screenwriter from the East Midlands who has written more than 40 original plays and adaptations of classic novels, commissioned by theatres including the Almeida, Hull Truck, East Riding Theatre, the Rose Playhouse and the Customs House South Shields. Her plays have been performed across the UK, Europe and Asia. Laura is Resident Playwright at Chapterhouse Theatre Company, and Associate Playwright at both the Petersfield Shakespeare Festival and Novo Productions. In 2020, Laura established her own theatre company, Fury Theatre, to focus on female stories told with fire. Laura’s first feature LAPWING recently finalised post-production, featuring Hannah Douglas (Clownface), Emmett J. Scanlan (Hollyoaks, The Fall) and Sebastian de Souza (Skins, Ophelia). Her BBC New Creatives short film INSIDE premiered on BBC4 in May 2020 and her BFI Network funded short films Going Country and Pennywort recently began festival runs; Going Country won a Best Picture award at the LA Film Awards, and three Outstanding Achievement Awards at the LA International Film Awards, including for Best Original Screenplay. Laura’s short film THE EMPTY THRONE previously won a BUFVC Learning on Screen Award at BFI Southbank. Laura has written for BBC EastEnders: E20 and the Holby City and Casualty shadow schemes and currently has a television pilot in development with Shot of Tea Productions. She is a member of BAFTA Crew, Badass.Gal and the European Cultural Parliament’s Future Generations Initiative, and lectures in Writing for Theatre and Screenwriting at the University of Lincoln. Laura is currently developing two feature projects and several new plays and is currently a Finalist in the Women of the Future 2020 Awards. In her writing, Laura is passionate about exploring female-driven narratives that ask questions about who we are today, often through the lens of the past.

Richard Hall

Upon completing a 30-year career as a Police Officer with Nottinghamshire Police, Richard decided to study photography via a BA(Hons) degree course at Lincoln College. He purchased his first camera in 2017.

During the course he photographed the entire rehearsals and live performances of Oliver! at Lincoln Cathedral for the Starring Lincoln Theatre Company, and quickly became their official photographer. His photography was used across social media as well as for publicity purposes. His Flickr account has received over 6 million hits and he has rapidly built a reputation for his theatre photography. Richard has also worked with other theatre companies including Chapterhouse and the Asylum Players and hopes to resume these associations after the current pandemic.

As well as the theatre photography, during the summer of 2019 he was the primary photographer for the British Transplant Games in Newport and subsequently went onto become one of a team of photographers covering the World Transplant Games in Gateshead. Richard was contracted as the principal photographer for the 2020 British Transplant Games in Coventry but sadly those Games had to be cancelled.

During the period of the first Lockdown of 2020 Richard produced a book of 178 doorstep portraits from his home village of Caythorpe, Lincolnshire. The book received critical acclaim including gaining him an Associate Distinction with the Royal Photographic Society in Contemporary Photography.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to thank Laura Turner for kindly agreeing to write a piece of poetry to support and provide a narrative framework for the photography in this book. This work could not have been produced without the generosity and trust of the models I had the pleasure of working with, including my long-suffering wife Dona, Lucy Jennings, Natalia Skrzyniarz and Luna the British Shorthair.

For advice and support I am grateful to John Blakemore, Tyler Rayner, Stewart Wall, Robert Herringshaw, Carol McNivan Young, Mally Roberts, and the many other people who have offered support and advice.

-R. H.

All images © Richard Hall

Book Design and Editing by Richard Hall

Photographer Richard Hall

Vanishing © Laura Turner

First Printing, First Edition, 2020.

Printed by bookprintinguk.com

Broadacres Publishing, Caythorpe, Lincolnshire.

Email: richardhallphoto@gmail.com

ISBN: 978-1-8380520-1-0

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including recording, photocopying, or otherwise, without prior permission from the publisher.