L.A.TIMOZ

I sat there on the strip, next to the beach in Los Angeles. It was in late spring.

Four guys were playing ball against the wall. Their bodies were covered with tattoos.

They looked like they did not care.

I knew the more I waited the harder it was going to be, to get contact.
So, I walked up (with my black sunglasses on) to the one I thought was most friendly.
– Can I take your picture? He looked at me, started to walk away from where I was standing.
His friend looked at him and said – Was up?
The first guy answered, – I don’t know, was up! This guy; he thinks he’s a fucking FBI or something like that.

Then it happened. The first guy started to smile. The icebreaker, the connection that I was looking for.

I took up the camera then spent the afternoon with them. /.../

A bit later two beach cops showed up. The guys left fast.

Initially, I was in Vancouver to shoot for Absolut Vodka. This was only for one day, so we had 7 days off. Then my assistant came up with the idea—to take a drive to Los Angeles. I looked at him with a funny face and said – That’s far! The next morning we sat in the car. Four speeding tickets later, we were there.

Some time after, I got home to Sweden. A couple of guys were about to open a club at Sturehof in Stockholm. They wanted to do an art show with the pictures I took. The only thing was, I had no background information on these guys. So, my college; the Journalist Johan Lindberg came up with the brilliant idea—to lie. Then to name the art show “LATIMOZ” taken from Latin and Moz (a nickname for Steven Patrick Morrissey). The four guys I shot became immoderate “The Smiths ” fans, like that.

This was later reviewed in art magazines, as it was true. Frankly, maybe it was.

DANIEL SAHLBERG PHOTOGRAPHY © 2011

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Links: Daniel Sahlberg Photography
Previous work by Daniel on the F-blog: Fat fringes and A pedestrian display of affection.
Invited by Anders Blomqvist