NIGEL'S RAMBLES: Performing the Distant Past

Monday, September 4, 2023

Performing the Distant Past

From the late eighties until two thousand, I had a second job gig with our provincial theatre in Reggio Emilia and Aterballetto, which back then was an important dance company in Italy. I also did some photography for other theatres and dance/theatre companies as I met with visiting companies.

The theatre is acquiring my "performing arts" film negative archive for their historic archives. The negs were just rotting away in my old darkroom, so it is good they will be stored properly and preserved. I should have done it sooner, but I have been busy making digital scans of the things that interest me, and that I had not already scanned. My Nikon Z7 with 50mm macro, plus the ES2 attachment, makes it quite quick and easy. I think I have about 80,000 frames to look at, but with a lot of duplication and obvious fails. I used to expect to get about ten good pictures from a dance shoot with ten rolls of film.

It has been quite enjoyable going back over this photography, and I have found things I missed the first time around.

Here are a few quick conversions. The golf ball grain is due to Tmax 400ASA film pushed to 1600 and beyond. Capture One was used for the conversions, as it has dodging and burning tools like those I used in the darkroom. It is nice to have no paper waste and local contrast control. Corrections are quick and easy on the computer. These shots were mostly taken with my multiple Nikon FM2 or F801 bodies, that I used back then, with mostly the lovely Nikon Ai 180 F.8 and a Tamron 300mm 2.8. All manual focus and exposures were guessed as the stage lighting would invariably fool the light meter, although I did sometimes did use a Pentax spot meter.

These pictures are of their time. I was commissioned to take monochrome photographes, as this is what newspapers and magazines wanted. Access was quite easy back then, our theatre had few problems getting permissions to photograph visiting companies. The photographs I took for Aterballetto or Teatro Due where mostly taken live during the dress rehearsal. The little imperfections adds life to a performing arts photograph. A posed dance shot is easy to spot.

I am told things have changed. Companies are much more interested in controlling their "image", and permissions are not easy now. I see much more "posed in a studio"press release pictures now, and of course everything is now in colour.

The ease of the digital darkroom for these old pictures is amazing. I am not tied to a sigle contrast grade paper. I can use local contrast where it is needed. Local "burning and dodging" can be quickly experimented, without wasting a ton of paper. I am able to pull far more out of the negatives than I ever could in the "wet" darkroom.

Aterballetto

Sade, with Massimo di Rossi. The Marchese de Sade meets a Nun.

Riccardo Chailly, great fun to watch from backstage.

A sterner Claudio Abbado

Michele Abbondanza

Romeo e Giulietta, Aterballetto

Creating a choreography, Elleboro

Balletto di Toscana

Carolyn Carlson

Monica Francia, Sangue e Fragole. This dance piece was illuminated with hand held mechanics lamps. Nikon F801 Tamron 300 wedged between two theatre seats in lieu of IBIS or tripod.