GALLERY: Photographer documents wild Mongolia
THE love of horses and a determination to capture on film a disappearing culture propelled Hannah Rose Robinson into the adventure of a lifetime two years ago in Mongolia.
The photo series, The Last Nomad, by the 29-year-old Novocastrian has won acclaim, winning a slot in the Reportage Festival celebrating documentary photography at the recent Vivid Festival in Sydney.
It was not Robinson's first foray into unknown adventure. In 2009 she shot a photo series on homeless men living on the site of the former Empire Hotel on Hunter Street in Newcastle. She earned some top accolades for that work, too.
The Mongolian project was no easy feat. Although Robinson has loved horses since she was a youngster, travelling to an isolated country, renting a van and buying a horse and living among the locals was a major task. She and her four female travelling mates rode horses about 30 kilometres a day, following the local custom of stopping at the nearest home for shelter and food at the end of each day.
"They were open to strangers," she says. "Their custom is, if you travel the rule is that if you turn up, they feed you. They expect it when they travel."
Robinson's choice of camera was a Leica M6 Rangefinder, chosen for its unobtrusiveness. She shot 33 rolls of film, and worried throughout the trip home every time they went through an X-ray machine.
She did almost all of her shooting in black and white.
"I wanted to do the opposite," she says. "I wanted another challenge, to be thinking all the time."
Communication was difficult.
"I hired a translator at one point, but he only knew 'Yes, I understand,' and 'Yes, in five minutes,' " she says.
"But we stayed with his family and met his dad, who was an excellent horseman. We didn't speak any English, we spoke horse."
The constant diet of meat was hard on Robinson, a vegetarian.
The basic meal was often flour noodles and meat in hot water, with Robinson favouring the hot flavoured water most of the time. The other staple was deep fried bread in butter and sugar.
She calls the food all "part of the adventure" and admits to dreaming about fresh broccoli.
The local custom of drinking vodka to bless journeys was equally hard.
"Getting on a horse at 7am after three shots of vodka makes for a tough day," she says.
The works are showing at Global Gallery in Paddington.
The photo series, The Last Nomad, by the 29-year-old Novocastrian has won acclaim, winning a slot in the Reportage Festival celebrating documentary photography at the recent Vivid Festival in Sydney.
It was not Robinson's first foray into unknown adventure. In 2009 she shot a photo series on homeless men living on the site of the former Empire Hotel on Hunter Street in Newcastle. She earned some top accolades for that work, too.
The Mongolian project was no easy feat. Although Robinson has loved horses since she was a youngster, travelling to an isolated country, renting a van and buying a horse and living among the locals was a major task. She and her four female travelling mates rode horses about 30 kilometres a day, following the local custom of stopping at the nearest home for shelter and food at the end of each day.
"They were open to strangers," she says. "Their custom is, if you travel the rule is that if you turn up, they feed you. They expect it when they travel."
Robinson's choice of camera was a Leica M6 Rangefinder, chosen for its unobtrusiveness. She shot 33 rolls of film, and worried throughout the trip home every time they went through an X-ray machine.
She did almost all of her shooting in black and white.
"I wanted to do the opposite," she says. "I wanted another challenge, to be thinking all the time."
Communication was difficult.
"I hired a translator at one point, but he only knew 'Yes, I understand,' and 'Yes, in five minutes,' " she says.
"But we stayed with his family and met his dad, who was an excellent horseman. We didn't speak any English, we spoke horse."
The constant diet of meat was hard on Robinson, a vegetarian.
The basic meal was often flour noodles and meat in hot water, with Robinson favouring the hot flavoured water most of the time. The other staple was deep fried bread in butter and sugar.
She calls the food all "part of the adventure" and admits to dreaming about fresh broccoli.
The local custom of drinking vodka to bless journeys was equally hard.
"Getting on a horse at 7am after three shots of vodka makes for a tough day," she says.
The works are showing at Global Gallery in Paddington.
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