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IN TOUCH – Paralympic games and the art of blind photography

TX:Ìý 24.08.2021Ìý 2040-2100

PRESENTER:Ìý ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý PETER WHITE

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PRODUCER:Ìý ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý BETH HEMMINGS

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White

Good evening.Ìý Tonight, we drop in on Tokyo, as the Paralympics finally get underway.

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Paralympics Opening Ceremony

Please stand for the national anthem of Japan.Ìý

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Music – National anthem

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White

Part of the opening ceremony earlier today, courtesy of Channel 4.

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And we meet two visually impaired photographers, including one who has no sight at all.

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Clip

I could take photos that would mimic how sighted people see but why would I do that.Ìý The world I envision is partly my imagination but built from all the other senses.

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White

All of which confirms there’s not much visually impaired people can’t do when they put their minds to it.Ìý Which is why we start with your very strong responses to our item last week which confirmed that only around one in four visually impaired people of working age have a job and that this figure has hardly changed over the past 50 years.Ìý So why not?Ìý According to Jonathan Fisher, a key factor is who’s in charge at the top.

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Fisher

I began my teaching career in 1974 with severely limited partial sight in a comprehensive school.Ìý After my first full year I moved to a special school where, before my first day’s work, the head made it clear that despite sitting on the interview panel he did not want me.Ìý After two years or so I had a transfer to a different comprehensive school where a totally blind colleague was well established.Ìý The appointment there was entirely due to the headmaster’s enlightened attitude.

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White

As for Richard Foster, he feels there’s only one conclusion to be drawn from the fact that 90% of employers think it would be difficult or impossible to employ blind people in their companies.Ìý And 94% of the general public believe that blind people couldn’t do their job.

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Foster

Nothing changes.Ìý Perhaps it’s time to improve benefits for those who the majority of the population think are incapable of working.Ìý Being unemployed and living on derisory benefits is bad enough but we miss out on things like workplace pensions, a social life and the possibility of making lasting friends and even finding partners.Ìý The current talk around the pandemic is the increase in people with mental health problems, for those who are not working or socialising.Ìý Well, I have news for the rest of the population – blind and partially sighted people have had these issues day after day for years.

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White

And John is also depressed by the persistence of unrealistic attitudes about the capabilities of blind people.

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John

I’m afraid the findings of the survey came as absolutely no surprise to me, both in terms of the numbers and the attitudes of employers, and the public generally.Ìý There is a huge reservoir of goodwill among the public towards blind and partially sighted people.Ìý The genuine kindness and helpfulness that I, and I’m sure others, experience everyday is testimony to that.Ìý But unfortunately, those good feelings do not translate into the leap of imagination that is required of employers to enable them to understand how someone with a sight impairment may be able to do the job as well as they do without sight.Ìý The Minister signally failed to answer Peter’s questions, not, in my view, because he was being evasive but rather because he didn’t have any answers.

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White

And some would say that we’re just about to have proof of John’s point with the start of the Paralympics.Ìý Huge admiration for the competitors without it necessarily translating into an understanding of what visually impaired people can do in the job market and with their day-to-day lives.Ìý But enough of that.Ìý Our reporter, Mani Djazmi, is in Tokyo where the games are finally about to begin.

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Although, Mani, it has to be said that over here, this morning, a lot of the reporting was about not sport but about the escalation of covid, especially in the capital.Ìý Is that what you’re experiencing, as far as what people are saying?

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Djazmi

Well, as you’ll remember, before the Olympics there was a lot of public dissent against those games going ahead.Ìý But Japan had a very good games, they had the best ever games and I think opposition kind of wanned a bit.Ìý The irony is that the covid figures are much worse now than they were before the Olympics.Ìý But, yeah, I mean it’s difficult for me to tell you, Peter, because I can’t really talk to any of them.

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White

So, is anyone in the organisation saying out loud that the games could still, even at this late stage, run into trouble because of the infection rate?

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Djazmi

No, I don’t think there’s that feeling publicly, certainly not publicly but privately, also.Ìý I mean this is the biggest ever Paralympics, in terms of athletes, there are more athletes at these games than ever before.Ìý And the President of the International Paralympic Committee, Andrew Parsons, says that it’s precisely because of the impact of Covid-19 on disabled people that these games must go ahead.

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Parsons

The pandemic has disproportionately affected persons with disability around the world and the Paralympic Games is the only global event that puts persons with disabilities at centre stage.Ìý So, it’s the only moment at a global level that they are given the voice.Ìý And we believe that this is the moment where they need their voice to be heard the most.Ìý So, this is – I think it was super important, it is vital, that we have these games to bring back disability to the heart of the inclusion agenda.

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White

So, Mani, that was Andrew Parsons of the International Paralympics Committee.Ìý Enough of the politics, how are the athletes making out in these rather unusual circumstances, especially the visually impaired ones?

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Djazmi

Well, it’s important to remember that the athletes still race and swim and lift in the same kind of arenas as they would do in pre-pandemic times.Ìý So, you know, they are very much geared up to trying to win or retain Paralympic medals.Ìý But, having said that, it’s not the same as it has been, even in the village – not much mixing going on between the athletes.Ìý I’ve been speaking to the Dutch totally blind swimmer, Liesette Bruinsma, who was at Rio, I’m really glad she was at Rio because that was – that would have been a joyous occasion.Ìý It’s not so much now but she’s been talking about that and also telling me how she’s able to get around the village independently.

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Bruinsma

You have the guideline on the street, so I can find the dining hall myself.Ìý And in the elevator, there are on the buttons braille, so I can feel which floor I am.Ìý The elevator talks but I can’t understand Japanese.

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Djazmi

Well, I’m blind as well and I’ve got braille in my hotel room but unfortunately, it’s Japanese…

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Bruinsma

It’s difficult to read the buttons on the toilet.

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Djazmi

What’s the atmosphere like, you know, have you been able to talk to other athletes from different countries or is everyone social distancing?

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Bruinsma

A little bit because we changed bins and then you have a little moment to talk to another people but it is less social than other games and we are only with the swimmers in the elevator, we drink no coffee with the other teams of the Netherlands and that’s a little bit, yeah, bad.Ìý But I understand it, it’s necessary, yeah, but it’s not fine.

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White

It’s really rather sad, isn’t it, Mani, part of the joy of these events is the athletes mixing with other teams from different countries and then mixing with the people in the city where the games are held, that’s just not going to happen is it.

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Djazmi

No it’s not, I mean this my third Paralympics, you’ve been to more but every other – every single Paralympic games is characterised by just seeing athletes out and about.Ìý I remember in London 2012 so many of them just hung out at the Westfield shopping centre, just having food there or just browsing.Ìý And it was great, you always heard journalists say – oh yeah, I saw so and so from the Netherlands team the other day just buying some trainers.Ìý

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White

Just briefly, Mani, what’s the timetable now, especially the events in which blind and partially sighted people are taking place, what’s happening in the next few days?

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Djazmi

Well, happily, sport is happening from Wednesday and listeners may remember Elliot Stewart, who was on the programme a few weeks ago, he’s a judoka, who’s making his debut in the Paralympics – Judo’s coming home – of course, going to Tokyo and by the time we speak next week it’ll all be over for him, for good or bad, he’s taking part at the end of this week.Ìý And Hannah Russell will be defending her 100 metres backstroke title on Sunday in the pool.Ìý Next week Libby Clegg, the perennial Libby Clegg, will be defending her title in the 200 metres sprint in athletics.

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White

Mani Djazmi, try and enjoy yourself in these strange circumstances and thanks very much and we’ll welcome you back next week, hopefully with news of some medals.

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Of course, sport is only one way of getting fulfilment but if you’ve not been a regular listener to In Touch you might be surprised at the number of visually impaired people whose chosen form of self-expression is photography.Ìý Less surprising that people still with useful vision find ways to adapt what they do but there are even people with no vision who still find satisfaction from taking pictures.Ìý I’m going to be joined by one of them, I’ll be talking to Pete Eckert, in a moment, who joins us from Sacramento in California.Ìý But first, Karren Visser.Ìý You’ve had poor sight from childhood, which has deteriorated as you’ve got older, just explain what photography has meant to you.

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Visser

Initially photography was, for me, about looking at situations and trying to understand them and particularly observing people.Ìý As my sight has changed, I’ve found that it’s become more of a tool, that’s enabling me to see things that I can’t see quickly or I miss details.Ìý And so, what I’m missing out now and when I photograph and I go back and look again, like looking twice, I can then see things that I’m now missing and that’s a way, also, of helping me retain that memory.Ìý However, my sight is deteriorating fairly rapidly and so, that sense of knowing, is also changing and what’s happening now is a third approach and that is I’m finding I don’t need to see and register the detail because I’m visualising and imagining more.Ìý What I’m finding with light painting photography, is I’m now photographing in complete darkness using a torchlight and a slow shutter release and it really is from my imagination.

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White

I think this brings us rather neatly to Pete, as someone who can’t see, because surely imagination has to be part of what you do Pete.Ìý I mean you have retinitis pigmentosa, which is usually a progressive condition and you’ve said – I didn’t really take photography seriously until I lost all my sight.Ìý Just explain what you meant by that.

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Eckert

When I do photography, I’m using the camera as something to gather light but I’m using it more as a painter.Ìý A painter can seize what he wants to do or she may want to do and then works with the camera, so it’s a conversation between you and the cameras back and forth.Ìý Well, I’m doing the same thing, I’m deciding on what I want to do first, which is different from all photographers, I’m not going out looking for the shot, I can see the shot first, and then I begin to build the image.Ìý Any light that you can have a conception of how much light is there you can build an image.

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White

But Pete, how do you take satisfaction from a picture if you can’t see the results?Ìý I understand that you can imagine it because you have been able to see but you don’t see the final result, do you?

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Eckert

No, I think of it as there’s the event, which I have all the control over, I do the work by myself and then there’s the product.Ìý And so in the event phrase, I memorise everything as I’m building, I’m using tricks of blindness or skills of blindness – memory, echo location, touching things – and then I’m building an image.Ìý And so, I’ve built this image in my mind’s eye, that’s my bang for the buck.Ìý After that, I have sighted people – friends usually – describe what the image looks like and then I match the two.

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Actuality – Pete Eckert working

So, the top of the car’s right there?

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Yes.

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You can stand next to me and I’ll operate the camera.

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There is the fire coming over the hood of the car.

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Okay, yeah, that’s exactly what I wanted.

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Eckert

It’s a method of the camera is a feedback loop for me, not only in the studio, I push myself out into the world and layer images, usually between what I do in the studio and what’s out in the world.

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White

You see this is intriguing because Karren, I know you’ve said that it’s your understanding that the visual memory fades as you lose it, is not what Pete is saying reassuring in a way because clearly he has got ways of hanging on to these memories?

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Visser

Enormously reassuring and that’s helping me plan for the future.Ìý Last night, in the dark, a friend and I went and photographed alongside the River Cam and the streetlights were very uncomfortable on my eyes, in fact physically painful and so it took quite some time.Ìý And in the end, I got what I wanted that I had visualised in my mind’s eye for weeks on end, I had to get it before I could leave.Ìý And this friend of mine, she understood that.

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White

Pete, can I just change tack a bit because you work as a photographer, you work for a number of major companies.Ìý Can you just explain that, what you do and why they trust you?

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Eckert

Most of these companies have come to me but in the production of a product that I’m making I put in – I call it the fingerprints of blindness – how do I differentiate my work from just taking a snapshot.Ìý And that’s what has caught some curiosity from these companies because what I do, they’re guaranteed to get results that have never been seen before.

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White

I just want to bring you two down to a earth a little bit because I mean you are very serious photographers, what about visually impaired people who just want to take a picture of, you know, the dog or their children.Ìý I mean what would you say to them because people may well be thinking it’s not worth it, I can’t see anymore, I can’t see very much, why would I take a picture.

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Visser

Peter, I’ve got recent experience over the past year of lockdown working with Multistory, an arts organisation in the West Midlands and Sandwell Visually Impaired and we did exactly that, because we couldn’t meet up and so we had to find a way and some of the participants are blind and to try and create small digital stories that were important to them and even though they couldn’t see we select to – help them select images from family albums, we went through a process of audio describing the images so that the words were their own.Ìý And the feedback I got from that was could we do more, could we learn with our phones and our iPads or tablets to photograph.Ìý One person, who was quite sceptical to begin with, is now photographing his guide dog and wants to download an app to do slow shutter release images at night going for walks with a friend.Ìý And it’s more that we’ve captured, between all of us, collaboratively, our imaginations and seeing the possibilities and I think it’s helped alleviate isolation.Ìý It’s been a talking point with families listening and engaging in the process.

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White

Let me just end with Pete and play the role of the sceptic that Karren has rather kind of – you didn’t suggest I was but I probably am a bit, as a totally blind person who’s never been able to see.Ìý Isn’t there an element in this of holding on to something which has actually gone?Ìý Some people might say – come on, you took photographs when you can see but is it really a practical thing to do when you can’t?

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Eckert

It’s very practical.Ìý For me, my interest and my, what I call my bang for my buck, is the effort of putting together the image.Ìý I definitely have a mind’s eye image of what’s happened and it’s built up over time, layering light on.Ìý And so, I actually get to see, I know what each of my images looks like and I got what I wanted and it’s the proof for the sighted people that he can actually do this.

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White

Pete Eckert, Karren Visser – thank you both very much indeed.

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And that’s it for today.Ìý Do tell us about your own pleasure or perhaps the odd difficulty in photography and also any other perhaps interests that you wouldn’t expect a visually impaired person to have.Ìý And don’t forget it’s a last call for your questions to Ofcom about audio description and how its performance on live or on demand TV could be improved.Ìý You can email your comments or questions to intouch@bbc.co.uk, you can leave messages on 0161 8361338 or you can go to our website bbc.co.uk/intouch from where you can also download tonight’s and previous editions of the programme.

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From me, Peter White, producer Beth Hemmings and studio managers Sue Stonestreet and Owain Williams.Ìý Goodbye.

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