An Interview With Seth Fluker

Seth Fluker is a Canadian photographer who lives in London. For the 2010 Photo Issue he took this picture of some pink swirly stuff. After the jump, he explains what it is.

Vice: Tell us about your picture in the Photo Issue.
Seth Fluker: That image is from my book called Before Things Change. It's a series of photographs I took while working at Whole Foods. It's the contents of my sink over a five-month period. In total, I shot about 1100 photos, which I edited down to 14.

What was your job at Whole Foods?
My job at Whole Foods was kitchen porter, which meant I washed a lot of dishes and took out garbage and just… fuck, it's just the worst job you can actually think of. Wait, don't use that. It's just a shitty job. Pretty boring.

Did taking the pictures help you get through the day?
Oh for sure! I was so bummed when the series was done because, after that, going to work just felt so much shittier. Like, when I was doing the photos, I would go in thinking: Man, I hope there's tonnes of plates for me to wash today. So when I stopped doing that, it was definitely not as fun.

Are you still working there?
Yeah, but I only have one more week left. Four more shifts. It feels pretty good.

Did your bosses know you were taking the pictures?
The first 200, they had no idea. I hid that I was doing it because I'd read in the employee handbook that no photographs were allowed. But then I explained the situation to them and they were cool with it. They said I could do it as long as it didn't affect my job. So I just made sure I worked really hard.

Have they seen it?
Yeah, a bunch of people I work with bought the book. I haven't shown it to any of the big bosses or anything though.

How much time, in total, would you say you spent taking pictures of your sink?
I'd say probably 500 hours.

And how much did you get paid per hour?
£6.25.

So you were paid about three grand taking these? Do you think you made a profit after developing and printing the book and stuff?
No, definitely not. I shot, like, a thousand pictures and it would cost me about five quid to develop each roll.

Five pounds? Is that because you're impatient and paid for one-hour developing?
Ha, yeah. Only if I thought I had something amazing. But then they would usually turn out to be the films with nothing good on them.

Do you remember what makes up all of these pictures? I can't believe some of them were taken in a sink. They look like space.
Well, I know that one was made with teriyaki sauce and couple of other cooking oils. For a lot of them, I would just experiment by throwing a bunch of stuff into my sink and see what would happen.

Is it all stuff that was meant to be there? Or did you waste some perfectly good sellable food?
For the photo in the Photo Issue, I used some of that cheese that you use in lasagne. You know that foamy stuff?

Foamy cheese? What?
Yeah, that's a pretty bad description. But that picture is made of that cheese and some beetroot juice, which I got from the juice bar.

That's so crazy that you can remember what these pictures are made of. How about this one above?
I have no idea.

Oh, well there goes my sink-Rain Man theory. What else do you like from the new Photo Issue?
I think it's really good, to be honest.

I think you're only supposed to say "to be completely honest" when you're saying something bad.
Well, what I meant is that I don't just think it's great because I have a photo in it. There are a lot of people in here I really like, like Wolfgang Tillmans and Jeurgen Teller and McGinley. My favourite is probably the Mapplethorpe photo.

One last thing, Jonnie Craig texted me and asked me to ask you, "Apart from magenta, what is your favourite colour?"
I dunno. Blue, I guess.

Oh, I figured he wanted me to ask because it was an in-joke or there'd be a funny answer.
No, I don't think so. Oh, and green. I like green.

Great, thanks Seth!

You can buy Seth's book Before Things Change here.