Bruce Connew is 60 today. And again tomorrow, because he is in France where it isn’t yet 31 August.
This photo is of him in 1985, in August I think but definitely in South Kensington, London. I snapped it the day he emerged from apartheid South Africa where he had been in the townships photographing necklacing and the like – basically, risking his life every day. Still, he got a very good book out of it, South Africa.
In 1989 he slipped over the Thai border to spend time with and photograph the Karen insurgents in their civil war against the Burmese junta – basically, risking his life every day. Still, he got a very good book out of it: On the Way to an Ambush.
After that trip when he was in the infectious diseases (i.e. in those days Aids) ward at Auckland Hospital nearly dying of malaria he was gaunt, had the moustache in the photo and wore checked shirts. Such a gay look, not that there’s anything wrong with that. I lived nearby so visited him every day bearing a Fru-Ju, and the nurses thought it was lovely that his boyfriend was so attentive.
Since then Bruce has produced more books on subjects as varied as muttonbirding and ethnic relations in Fiji, had a photo essay (the cover story) in Granta, and most recently produced the book and exhibition I Must Behave.
Bruce is like so many of my friends: behaving is something he has seldom done. Something about that word “must”, perhaps.
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