Games of Chess

Two re-enacters play chess in front of some tents around which are pieces of military uniform and other items of clothing. I don’t know anything like enough about historical garb to say whether the pair’s outfits are properly authentic, or even consistent with each other. Still, to my inexpert eye, the overall impression allows at least for a suspension of disbelief. Looking more closely at the full-sized image one can see a couple of anachronisms, with the woman’s doubly-pierced ear and what looks like a tattoo at the back of her neck. And then there are the pair of jokers out of focus in the backround who look as though they’ve wandered in from a different movie.

The shot was taken with a Yashica Mat camera loaded with Kodak Portra 160 NC film at the ‘Sail’ festival in Karlskrona, Sweden in 2008. I must somehow look like I have a knack for chess – no few people have supposed it – but I’ve no aptitude for the game at all. The one other chess-related photo I’ve taken that comes to mind is the one below, a black-&-white shot of an outsize, outdoor chessboard in Wämöparken, also in Karlskrona. This one was captured the following summer, using my other TLR, a Mamiya C330S on Rollei Retro 100 film that I developed myself using Rodinal.