Purple Haze – 100th Army v Navy Revisited

Earlier this year I posted a blog - Superheros and Comic Strips - it introduced an ongoing collapboration between Alligin Photography and Rob where we are revisiting some of the images taken from the 100th Army Navy Match.  This blog continues the theme but places the original photograph and the final image side by side.

Purple Haze from an original image by Andrew Fosker is a reinterpretation of a Royal Navy spectator photograpghed sat amongst empty chairs.  Purple Haze is the title of a song by legendary guitarist Jimi Hendrix released in 1967 as a follow up to Hey Joe.  Hendrix always remained silent on the meaning behind the song but at the time most contemporary writers believed it was firmly linked in with the culture surrounding psychedilic drugs.  However what ever the meaning behind the lyrics the song proved to be a great success and was inducted in to the Grammy Hall of Fame.

When I first saw Rob's interpretation my background and the linkage to a Service rugby event made me naturally inclined to put it in the category of interesting but do not use for fear of the implications.  However the idea behind the project is to provoke thought through re-interpretation.  This the image clearly does and the rest is then my prejudice about what is right and wrong - which we know is a concept that history shows is continually revised.  So on that basis alone and following the maxim of Benjamin Jowett "Get it over with and let them howl" I decided to include it in this blog.

The original photograph has the Army's winger, Junior Bulumukau, trying to fend off the Royal Navy's repalcement flanker Dom Taylor.  The tattooed arm belongs to Royal Navy centre, Grge Loydall, and is almost incidental to the image.

With a severe crop the feel of the image is changed and given a very different emphasis.