PHOTO: KRISTIAN FRIRES

"I'D LIKE TO THINK THAT ELEMENTS OF MY PERSONAL WORK LEAK INTO MY PROFESSIONAL WORK... THEY INEVITABLY DO I THINK."

CONOR CLARK IS A NEW ZEALAND PHOTOGRAPHER, BASED IN AUCKLAND, WHOSE WORK ENCOMPASSES BOTH COMMERCIAL AND ARTISTIC REALMS. WWW.CONORCLARKE .CO.NZ

ME: DID YOU DECIDE PRETTY MUCH AT ART SCHOOL, THAT YOU WANTED TO WORK AS COMMERCIAL PHOTOGRAPHER, OR WAS IT A LONGER PROCESS?

CONOR CLARKE:No I didn't. I went to art school to be a painter and learnt photography as a means of documenting my paintings. I quickly found that I could use the photographic medium to realise my ideas much better than I could with paint. I enjoyed the process of collecting images and making 'paintings' or constructions out of these collected photographs, as opposed to painting them from scratch. In terms of commercial photography, this is something I kind of fell into by starting to photograph my flatmates' band, and then their friends bands and so on, etc. that's how I got into live music photography, then events and portraiture (which is my preferred area).

ME: WHICH ARTISTS, PHOTOGRAPHERS DO YOU ADMIRE?

CONOR CLARKE: ohhh lots...a mix or artists, photographer and both: but the first ones that come to mind, and are therefore probably my favourites are Patricia Piccinini, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Jae Hoon Lee, Fiona Connor, Fiona Amundsen, Loretta Lux, Yvonne Todd.

ME: HOW DO YOU DIFFERENTIATE BETWEEN YOUR COMMERCIAL AND ART PHOTOGRAPHY?

CONOR CLARKE: Commercial photography generates the money I need to live, and to make my personal work. It is generally always commissioned, and almost always shot digitally (whereas all personal work is shot on 6x7 film). The personal stuff is what I'm passionate about. Things I'm interested in, things that I research and collect. Almost always symmetrical, and ordered. Interests are: colonialism, the need for order and therefore disorder, front yards, topiary, formal gardens, roses, the need for maintenance, the culture of collecting, labelling, symmetry, competitiveness and pride, all things that are normalising.... I'd like to think that elements of my personal work leak into my portrait work...they inevitably do I think.

ME: YOUR COMMERCIAL PHOTOGRAPHY FOCUSES ON PEOPLE AND PORTRAITS AND IN YOU ART WORK (FROM WHAT I'VE SEEN) THERE IS NO ONE!INTENTIONAL?

CONOR CLARKE:Actually not all that intentional...sometimes there are people in the backgrounds of some of my personal images...if they walk in, etc. I enjoy photographing people a whole lot, but I find in my personal work I prefer to be more subtle in my approach, and find that using images of people say too much. Their clothes, their expression, the style of their hair, their make-up, etc. I guess they say too much about perhaps their upbringing, their class, social status, the time it was shot, etc. I prefer to photograph evidence of people, for example a photograph of someone's front yard says a whole lot to me about who they are as a person, or as a family. It would kind of ruin it for me if I were to actually put the people in the shot.

ME:I KNOW THAT YOU ARE A MUSIC FAN AND YOU HAVE BEEN WORKING FOR "RIP IT UP" MAGAZINE, IS THERE YOUR FAVOURITE AREA OF COMMERCIAL PHOTOGRAPHY?

CONOR CLARKE:Like I said earlier...the music thing is something I just fell into. I do enjoy it, and meeting lots of interesting people is pretty great. I guess the problem always comes back to the fact that there's not a lot of money floating around in the music industry so you end up working very cheaply. You do it for the love, and for the learning experience more than anything. My fav. area though is anything portrait. I love shoots that have an idea, theme or narrative involved, otherwise it's just a photo.