Objects
by Martin Parr

As well as being an internationally renowned photographer, Martin Parr is an addicted collector of photographs, books, postcards and – as presented this book – eccentric objects and ephemera.

Featuring almost 500 items gathered by Parr over 30 years, many from online auctions, they are "his highly personal reflection upon history – shadows of human foible", as he describes their connecting thread in his introduction.Subjects and themes in the collection include: Maggie Thatcher; the British miners’ strike of 1984–5; Saddam Hussein; Russian cosmonauts; the Spice Girls; and household photographic trays.

The collection ranges from the trivial and banal to the hilarious and poignant... welcome to his world!

From the introduction by Martin Parr:

I have a very strong collecting gene, and the pages of this book are testimony to this condition. It started early. When I was very young I gathered together a museum of items such as pellets (balls of fur and bones, spat out by birds of prey), fossils and birds’ nests in the cellar of our semi in Chessington, Surrey.

Over the years, these collecting habits have shifted and become more refined. I have collected stamps, bus tickets, Victorian pennies and, my biggest collection to date, photographic books.

This book contains a suite of collections that are interlinked. They echo the themes of my work as a photographer, which I also define as a form of collecting. By applying some order to our chaotic world, and assembling things into categories and ultimately into a book or a show, I can make a more coherent statement about my relationship to the world.

I am also very attracted to objects which are ephemeral. Their significance and cultural context changes as the world moves on. Many of these objects are associated with people or events that are bound up with the glories of a certain time and place. When these glories fade, the object takes on a certain resonance, and that is the driving force behind the collections represented here.

You may wonder what exactly it is that fuses all these items together into one resolved collection. It all seems very obvious and logical to me. These are the items that are left behind after momentous and not-so momentous events, or after world leaders are long gone. They are shadows of human foible.

Hardback, 176 pages
240 x 192mm / 9.5 x 7.5 inches
500 colour photographs
ISBN: 978-1-905712-08-3
Chris Boot Books

List price: £19.95
On offer: £16.00