IN CONVERSATION WITH GORDON MASSIE

‘PLUS ÇA CHANGE PLUS C’EST LA MÊME CHOSE’ In conversation with Gordon Massie By Laura de Harde

Documentary photographer Gordon Massie, used the above proverb by Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr (b. 1808 - d. 1890), meaning ‘the more things change, the more they stay the same’, to describe his fascination with, and the motivation behind, his photography process. Over the course of his life, Massie has resided, for extended periods, on three different continents. In each instance he has actively embraced the culture and immersed himself in the country that he, for that period, calls home. His enthusiasm for exploring his surroundings motivates him to embark on lengthy walks, with his camera in hand. Massie frequently begins these excursions by determining a destination. For example, in 2018 he visited what was left of the Irish Volunteer Monument in Brixton, Johannesburg (image 2). The discovery that the monument had been relocated, inspired another outing a few months later, this time to Orania in the Free State (image 3).

During his walks Massie begins by looking, seeing and then documenting the places and spaces he encounters. Massie’s position remains in a constant state of flux, oscillating between visitor, traveller, explorer and settler, resident, homemaker. It is this dichotomy of identity that enables him to identify, and indeed make visible, the analogous threads between the seemingly disparate locations that he visits and photographs. Massie, aware of his own positionality, alludes to his thematic interests in the titles of two of his ongoing series, Empty Spaces and Living with Structures. He first photographed Empty Spaces in 2014 and then revisited the same site four years later in 2018. The series is an exploration of five vacant properties situated in the prime residential suburb of Upper Houghton in Johannesburg.

Laura de Harde took this photograph of Gordon Massie in action, during a research trip to Great Zimbabwe in 2015.

Image 2: Irish Volunteer Monument Base, Brixton, photographed by Gordon Massie in 2018

“Massie’s position remains in a constant state of flux, oscillating between visitor, traveller, explorer and settler, resident, homemaker.”

As the once stately homes sit patiently on the ridge, quietly awaiting their fate, a single security guard patrols the area acting as a deterrent for uninvited guests.

What continues to stimulate Massie’s fascination with these spaces is the ways in which his preconceived expectations of ‘change’ are met, and challenged, by each journey he makes to the site. His interest is in documenting what he sees, and it is through his images that he makes visible the inevitable passage of time. For Massie, ‘architectural structures can reflect more than the spaces they were originally intended for… read[ing] as a microcosm or reflections of aspects of political, historical and societal development and structures’ (Gordonmassie.com 2019).

A similar preoccupation with change (the changes that have taken place, and the change that may be expected to have occurred)

underlines Living with Structures. However, in this series, Massie does not confine his subject to any one particular location, instead he explores power laden human interventions in the land and cityscapes across continents in Argentina, England, Scotland, South Africa and Spain.

In curating Massie’s first solo exhibition, Cairn (2019) Suzie Copperthwaite and I disrupt the conceptual boundaries drawn between each body of work and extract themes that transcend the groupings determined by the artist. The title of the exhibition, Cairn (2019), is a Scottish Gaelic word and is therefore intertwined with Massie’s cultural heritage. Cairn is a collection of stones grouped to form a structure that serves as a memorial or landmark. The title has both conceptual and visual links to the works on display and viewers are invited to consider these connections. The exhibition runs from 16 – 25 October 2019.

Image 3: Irish Volunteer Monument, Karoo, photographed by Gordon Massie in 2018

By curating the exhibition thematically, conversations begin to emerge between the subjects of the photographs that in many instances are dissimilar in their locations, yet connected in ways that become apparent through Massie’s unique engagements with the sites. It is perhaps Massie’s distance from his subject that enables him to simultaneously see and reveal the parallels that run between the spaces and places that form the subject of his gaze.

For more information about the artist and the upcoming exhibition, follow Gordon Massie on Instagram or visit his website: Gordonmassie.com.

Image 4: Repeat photography process at the Great Enclosure, Great Zimbabwe. Photographed by Gordon Massie in 2015.