Contra-Invention Colour

The catalogue, which was included on Martin Parr's best books list, 2010, for Contra-Invention, an exhibition invited to Les Rencontres Internationales de la Photographie d’Arles, 2011 and From Here On at Arts Santa Mónica, Barcelona later, and nominated for the The Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize 2011. The catalogue contains photographs Traffic Wardens (correctly termed Civil Enforcement Officers or CEOs) took as proof of parking contravention, over a period of two years, when this practice was new in policing. At the time, before GDPR in Europe, the artist discovered that these images, of other people's poorly parked cars, could be accessed and downloaded from the local council's system. (Note: since the project, the system was later changed: art has an impact!) Interestingly, by default, embedded in the downloaded image files was information such as camera type, shutter speed, aperture and more, the kinds of data certain photographers love to keep. In addition, due to lack of expertise as photographers, CEOs occasionally captured themselves in reflection in their own pictures. Lastly it was possible for Mocksim to manoeuvre his way into the pictures by shadowing the wardens and waiting for that 'decisive moment'. For the touring show, three of the CEOs' photographs, night shots, were blown up to car size. The catalogue contains all the pics collected, along with the associated data, and a famous essay by Hito Steyerl.