chronos quest

"few walking companions can compete with the city itself, but the writer of the piece below is certainly one who matches and often exceeds his immediate surroundings. a walk with ben covers at a minimum the entire cosmos; that, for a few brief moments, somewhere on a suburban street in brixton, all seems to make sense.

for those not fortunate enough to share a pavement with ben, the piece below exploring his relationship with photography and walking captures some of the poetry of the experience" - adam (pedestrianist)I stopped posting my photographs on Instagram 18 months ago for a choir of reasons. I didn't stop making them. I carry a small compact camera with me every day. I have thousands of images that I hold dear, most of which will never see the light of day, but nevertheless, offer me earnest illuminations.

Photography is a praxis I care for deeply, that also cares for me. It aids my quest to conceive, create, reflect and accept. It gifts me access to the Tarot of life, that I may shuffle the images I collect, that they may collect me.

These moments that I encounter through the listless two step trance, when following in the glittering footsteps of my ghost, whose blind faith leans a few seconds into the riddled unknown, stoke the embers of my knowing that I may bravely heed the signs. There is a wandering feral intuition, alive in accident and adventure, that generously billows the inner compass, when given room to breathe.

If you go for a walk, not as the crow flies, but as the Fox drifts, if you pay attention, hold the moment lightly, note the symbols, feed them with feeling, great meaning is mirrored back to you, in a world that longs for our lucidity.

Photography grants us ritual permission to seek, to be still, to be focussed, to transform slices of time’s ribbon into epitaphs of eternity. I went walking in Highgate Cemetery last Saturday, and invited old Chronos to have his say and promised to pronounce it.

He reminded me of those forebears who have been walking with me since I was 18, of Wim Wenders, Agnes Varde, Chris Marker, Maya Deren and Werner Herzog. A gaggle of idiosyncratic kin, that smile on me, a toddler at the party. All wych’d by the mystery, all looking, all sharing more than their cameras saw, all waking us up.

There is a you inside you, who longs to walk with you, through every colour of feeling, everyday that you're lucky enough to wake up, and make meaning for the mystery, with or without, a camera’s glassy eye. Thank you for your time.