Appleby Horse Fair2024 - 2025
The second year I went, I saw twin boys dressed all in white or beige, little shorts, shirts, and shoes. A female photographer asked to take their picture. One boy was very shy, the other seemed up for it. Their father insisted they have their photograph taken; he was so proud. I watched as they posed in front of a garish cloth flag printed with an image of Jesus Christ.
Maybe the image on the flag was AI-generated; it reminded me of the Catholic Church’s rebrand at the beginning of Kevin Smith’s Dogma. If you know the film, you know what I mean.
I bet the photograph of those boys was a cracker of a picture, a male equivalent of Diane Arbus’s twins, via Stanley Kubrick, via Kevin Smith, via George Carlin unveiling a statue of Jesus giving a thumbs-up. I sometimes wish I could work in a more engaged way, rather than being a fly on the wall. As all this unfolded, at least two other photographers behind her tried to get a shot too. It felt tight to me. She’d done the hard work of the approach; they were scavenger photographers, and I doubt their shots were as good as hers anyway.