the “Other Half” is Not The Opposition
“Hello (Stuart )My name is Lorna, and I’m a 27 year old West Ham fan. I came across your website through Oh Comely magazine which I subscribe to. I was so happy seeing the article in the magazine, as it’s never featured football before. This has often concerned me, as I think football is just about one of the most beautiful things out there, and as a magazine it deals primarily with beautiful things. So it was so refreshing to read an article that captured that beauty and wonderfulness of football. And of course it led me to your website which I have been so happily viewing on my lunch break.
I first of all loved your answer in the interview about why you like football:
“It offers escapism, but also a realism, across people’s lives that they don’t get elsewhere. It makes them feel more real, more alive than anything else. Being at one with complete strangers; not knowing your fellow supporter but rooting for the same team. It’s a vigil and a struggle of life, because most of the teams aren’t going to win anything. I think it’s character building. But that doesn’t mean to say I can’t see the ridiculousness of it a lot of the time”
This was just one of the most accurate and perfect understandings of what football is and means to me, and how I feel standing in the crowd at Upton Park watching my team play shit football against Stoke on a rainy Tuesday evening, the utter, irrational love I have for that. So, that you for articulating that for me.
But of course, your photography is really what I’m writing this ridiculous fan mail for. As I say I’ve spent my lunch break looking through the gallery quickly, and then going back to study in more detail each photo. I’m about half way through now, and I need to stop so I can carry on with work. I’ll continue this evening at home. Anyway, I love them. They’re beautiful, wonderful photos that capture everything I love about football and everything surrounding it. I really can’t describe how happy they’ve made me, so really I just want to say thank you.
I was wondering, have you ever photographed Upton Park or West Ham fans?
(LATER THIS SAME DAY…)
Thank you for replying, how lovely of you. Of course I would be more than happy for you to blog it. The other part of your interview with Oh Comely that I enjoyed was your response to their question about you having a lot of women and girls in your photography. I love that, I love that it’s a conscious thing for you to focus on women in the crowd, giving us visibility without patronising or isolating us. I think that’s definitely an appeal to your photography. It’s certainly hard being taken seriously as a female football fan. An example being at the weekend I was talking to my friend’s new boyfriend at the pub. He’s a Bradford City fan and Emily told him I support West Ham. We had a nice conversation; about Blair Turgott’s loan spell with Bradford, about West Ham’s chances keeping Andy Carroll, and then this happened:
Lorna (me): “I went to the Bernabeu last November, we saw Real Madrid play Borussia Dortmund in a Champions League game
Him: “Yeah I’ve been there it’s great isn’t it.”
Lorna (me): “Yeah amazing. And it was a great game for me as Kaka played, and he’s one of my favourite footballers. He came on -”
Him: “Is he your favourite player because you fancy him?”
And that comment was just so rude, dismissive and totally discredited everything we’d spoken about previously in our conversation. So, yes. Sorry for the story!
I look forward to seeing your West Ham photos!
Have a great day, Kind regards, Lorna”
