“arriving with 1,2,3 or more yellow plastic jerry cans ready to be pumped full of water from deep underground”
THE BOREHOLE…
The idea for this image came from a combination of the technical wizardry I stumbled across creating my image ‘Night School’ in 2017 with David and also a very real requirement to fulfil a vision I had just before leaving Uganda in the same year.
Each evening…
…they would come along from all directions, arriving with 1,2,3 or more yellow plastic jerry cans ready to be pumped full of water from deep underground. The little guys would have the small trainee jerry cans, some creating make-shift trailers attaching a rope to old jerry cans chopped in half to drag the full ones home on.
I watched day after day…this was life; but more than that it was a time for all the children to come together socially and play at the end of another hot Ugandan day. In 2017 I left with an Idea which continued to grow throughout the following year, In 2018 I returned and I knew what I wanted to create but logistically it was not going to be easy. The first attempt did not go so well and I pulled the plug halfway along.
A few days later and just before leaving for home I organised round 2 and with the help of some ‘Sweetie Bomb’ lollipops and David who was both translator and light-stand, within 20 minutes had what I hoped were all the shots to pull this mammoth image off.
Over the next year, I processed the image, bit by bit, on and off and finally just before Christmas 2018 It was ready to make its return to the village in 2019…
Enjoy this short film of taking The Borehole back to show the children…
