Harry Borden looks back on a memorable 2012 shoot with the late Irish singer, songwriter and activist
In order to shoot great pictures, you ideally need an aesthetic sense, an understanding of light and a visual language of your own. However, a lot of the time getting memorable images is more about having the front to get into the right place than the right time, as my experience photographing Sinéad O’Connor shows.
In March 2012, I was commissioned to shoot portraits of Sinead to accompany an article about her in Stern magazine. That day, she was due to perform at St George’s Hall in Bristol after suffering a breakdown in the preceding months. She was publicising her first new album for five years, How About I Be Me (and You Be You)?
People often ask me what the celebrities I’ve photographed were really like in person, and although I can give my impressions of how someone appeared on the day, the truth is I often only get a very limited time with them, and I have a job to do. But in Sinéad’s case I do remember that she seemed very vulnerable and really raw emotionally. She was quite shy, introspective and difficult to read, but at the same time firm and sort of fierce as well.
Having said that, she was experienced enough in the music business to know that being photographed by me was all part of getting her album noticed and she was willing to go along with my requests. Equipment-wise, I was using my Canon EOS 5D Mark II and took all the shots with an EF 50mm lens.
Stern’s picture editor had largely given me a free hand for the shoot but had asked for a portrait of her against a white background which could potentially be used on the magazine’s cover. However, when looking around St George’s Hall, which was originally a Georgian church, I was excited to find an area that was essentially a neglected and overgrown graveyard at the rear of the building and asked her if I could photograph her there first.
Sinéad was willing to do that, and I really liked the atmosphere of those pictures. All the time, at the back of my mind I knew I had to get the shot against a white background but wanted to try several different locations in the same area. In a way, I shot myself in the foot by doing this, because when we’d finished outside Sinéad psychologically felt that she had given me all I needed, but I still hadn’t got that ‘white background’ shot.
