Here is my lovely French lady once again. I gave up trying to guess what order the photos were taken, so have just selected them randomly. I don’t think it really matters what order we see them in. She is photogenic and interesting in any of her snaps, no matter when they were shot. There are two more strips to show you before the big reveal about how she came back into my life. Stay tuned!
These are the last two strips of my beguiling femme fatale. Tomorrow I will conclude this series with how ma belle dame mystérieuse re-entered my life earlier this year.
October 2011
October 2011
There are now many different types of photobooth offering a huge array of options for your pics. My brother and sister-in-law, niece and nephew brought this one back for me from their first trip to Europe. I love the way the whole family squeezed in. They were somewhere in France, I think. I am thrilled they thought of me while there and remembered my photobooth addiction. They also gave me a luxurious, pink, heart-shaped gift-tin of delicious Fauchon chocolates. How spoilt am I?
I love the sepia toning of the colours, possibly produced due to blocked lights from so many people squishing in. What a wonderful effect the repetition has on the image, though we couldn’t figure out why it would come without the removable sticker feature you normally get with this format.
20/02/1994
February 1994, France
When this photo was taken in Argenteuil, which is just outside Paris, I had been studying French for 4 months. It has been so long since I used that language that every word I drag from my memory, I now doubt. Is “vivant la bonne vie” the correct way to saying “living the good life”? No matter, as I really was! Living as a student again, so soon after the experiences of Guatemala, was a great joy. I was meeting wonderful people, speaking mostly French and flying through my exams with top marks, not to mention the availability of wonderful culinary indulgences that the country has to offer. To supplement my income I was again making greeting cards, but instead of spruiking my wares to gift shops, I found a ready market in my fellow students.
This photo was taken on my way to visit a family friend of Del Holbrook, Georges. I bought the tulips for him and gave him one of the photos from the strip in exchange for one of his photobooth photos.
I do not know much about tokens for photobooth machines but they are highly sought after by collectors. They were used to replicate the size and weight of an American coin in countries where they were not used as currency i.e. everywhere other than the USA. I presume it saved the manufacturers of the booths having to adjust each machine for the varying coin sizes in each destination country. It seems there were many types of token available in each country, this one having been made for the Nouvelles Galeries (now Galeries Lafayette) department store in Paris.
October 1993, Annecy
I started my French lessons in Annecy on the 4th of October. I boarded with Madame and Monsieur Petit in Seynod, just outside Annecy. They were an amazing couple. Raymond had asked his wife Rolande to marry him when they were reasonably young, then took 12 years to agree to a wedding date. By the time they were married it was too late for them to have their own children, so they started fostering. They had raised over twenty kids, some from babies. All had grown up by the time I arrived. Needless to say they had plenty of room to accommodate foreign guests.
This photo was taken at the train station on the day I was dropped there by the coach from London, while I waited to be collected by the Petits.
October 1993
Early October 1993, London
I have written only “October 1993 French Visa Photo” on the back of this image. In reality it must have been taken in September as my visa was dated from late that month. Moana was still in Guatemala and as always, was a brilliant correspondent. I spent a lot of time with Helen White and was also in contact with some friends, Doug and Jay, who Moana and I had met in Guatemala. I was back to making and selling my hand made greeting cards and worked at Liberty up until two days before my departure by coach for Annecy.
I was thrilled to be the only bidder on this rare photobooth lenticular photo. It is made up of three exposures taken in succession on the same frame. The frame is placed under a lined sheet of acetate and when tilted appears to show movement.
In this example the lady’s eyes shift from the centre, then to the side and her mouth opens and closes. It is unfortunate that in the position needed to make a scan of the image, the sitter looks slightly cross-eyed. What you can see above is actually parts of two of the three individual exposures. For more information about these fabulous booth photos see Näkki Goranin’s book American Photobooth.
September 1993
Early September 1993, London
By the time this photo was taken I had decided to enrol to study French at the Institut Savoisien D’Études Français, a Department of the University of Savoy, in Annecy. The institute was for foreigners to learn French and starts from the beginner level. It was quite a surprise therefore, to find all the application forms and information about accommodation were solely written in French. I was extremely grateful to Del Holbrook for her French language skills, as the project wouldn’t have moved passed the enquiry stage without her help. I had less than a month left in London before the course started. I remember being very nervous as it was the first time I had gone anywhere on my own without the prospect of meeting up with friends on arrival.
August 1993
August 1993, London
While away, I decided that I would definitely give up my place on the museum studies course in London. Meeting an American, who spoke fluent French, at our language school in Antigua, made me reconsider past ambitions to learn to speak French. Back in London I reapplied to Liberty for a few months work, while deciding where to go to study in France.
This is a picture taken for my second identity card for Liberty of London.
Photobooth Journal 