The Monthly discusses John Baucher’s latest work “Try We Must: The impossible task of squaring the Circle”, and his transition from photographer to multi-media artist – Part 1 – Collecting flags and other icons

When we first met some time ago you were known as a photographer. Would it be reasonable to say your work covers many artistic genres now?

I’ve been edging towards working in different areas for quite a while. One of my first exhibitions, about the St George’s Cross, was at the old Lyric theatre and the photographs were presented as pages of a scrap book. I was always looking to stretch the boundaries of the way photographs were presented.

There was also the subject matter that I tended to gravitate towards; the area I live in, the cultural aspects of that area, flags, bonfires, marches.

I also tend to think deeply about the particular ways of presenting ideas, so when I was collecting flags, flags which represent that particular local culture, I have had to think deeply about the ways I might go about using those flags as art.

I did tend to stray towards non-commercial type of presentations, maybe conceptual art pieces, because I think I look at the bits and pieces which go to construct a flag and I think through ways of making art out of these found objects.

So a more gradual transition rather than a conscious shift?

One thing that is worth mentioning is that a few years ago, a guy bottled me, late at night, and nearly blinded me. That incident had an impact on me in that I wouldn’t be the same street photographer that I used to be. I used to walk around with a camera at the ready, waiting for things to photograph. I have pulled back from that.

Now I tend to use my phone and if something happens I might get a photograph. It would really have to be something that I see that interests me and I just let that happen. I don’t question that approach now.

But with the other work that I do, people have been describing me as an artist for some time now, actually they have been calling me that for longer than I have accepted that nomenclature.

A lot of the work you create is sculptural? Would that be fair to say?

Yes I think so, and a lot of the work is densely layered. As I said, I live in a Loyalist area and I just started collecting flags and other bits and pieces. One of my first flags was found behind a junction box near My Lady’s Road, before they built a block of flats there.

As an example of my thinking, if you think about taking down flags, most people are right handed so when the flags are being taken down and you rip the flag with your right hand, it has to be thrown to the ground in a particular way. You can’t throw it over your left shoulder, across your bodyweight, so it gets thrown to the right hand side and I just started looking to the right hand side of lamp-posts.

Once you have a bunch of flags, once you have a large collection, you then need to think about what you can do with them and how you might present them. To me you need to have clarity of thought, show what needs to be shown, don’t show anything that is not needed to be seen. This carries over from my work as a photographer working in Aerospace, early in my working life, where I was photographing parts in situ, There was a certain discipline required and that continues into my work today.