Mick's Photography Exhibit Toronto

[michelej1]

Broward Palm Beach New Times

Mick Fleetwood on His Photography: "Doing It for Myself and Doing It for Fun"


By Lee ZimmermanWed., Dec. 10 2014 at 8:56 AM

http://blogs.browardpalmbeach.com/co...etwood_mac.php

As he approaches the start of his sixth decade making music, Mick Fleetwood's status as a superstar is beyond dispute.

As one of two standard-bearers of the rock band Fleetwood Mac he cofounded some 48 years ago, he can lay claim to two of the biggest selling albums of all time -- Fleetwood Mac and Rumours -- and to helping launch the careers of some of England's greatest guitarists -- Peter Green, Jeremy Spencer, and Danny Kirwan among them. Indeed, despite the steady entry and exodus of key players, he's never wavered in his commitment to continue the group's musical mission. The band's new tour, celebrating the return of seminal member Christine McVie, is a testament to both his passion and perseverance.

Lately, though, Fleetwood has furthered his artistic ambitions with a series of photo exhibitions showcasing his lush scenic landscapes. He's currently represented in several galleries around the country, including an exhibit in Fort Lauderdale's Wentworth Galleries that continues through December 21.

Fleetwood attributes his initial interest in photography to time spent on holiday with his family as a child and particularly to the influence of his father, "the boring snapshot taker." In recent years, he's expanded his artistic ambitions, turning a casual pastime into an ongoing enterprise.

"If you really have a passion for it, you'll find a way to reconnect," he said by phone during a rare respite in the band's tour. "When I was asked to show my pictures, I was just doing it for myself and doing it for fun. I wondered why anyone would want to look at my pictures. Then the person who was nurturing me said, 'Because they're really good, Mick.' With music or anything that's creative, that's all you need. You don't have to be the greatest thing since sliced bread. If you're enjoying what you're doing, you may be surprised. You may have something that people will actually enjoy."

Having garnered this attention, Fleetwood has found a new mission beyond his muse, one he hopes will inspire others.

"With this little journey of showing my pictures, I've had great conversations with people," Fleetwood says. "I consider it a nice opportunity to talk about 'the creative process,' which I firmly believe in. Without that, I would have been in a whole heap of ****. If I hadn't become a musician and had my parents say, 'It's a pretty odd thing to do, Mick, to go out and bang a drum, but if that's what you really want to do, we'll support you,' I'm not sure what I would have done. So in talking about this, maybe someone out there will think, 'Well, he had a go at it -- why don't I?' "

Of course, Fleetwood's also aware that at least part of the reason his art gets attention is due to his famous name. "Yeah, hey, I'm very quietly aware of that, but I also got over that too," he insists. "There's a good and healthy double-edged sword here. I know there are people walking into that gallery to look at my pictures because they know about Mick Fleetwood the rock star. But I also know I've put my ass on the line and they might think it's a whole bunch of ****. [laughs] I'm already quietly objective and in good humor about what I'm doing. I've found that people like the work. There are people that say, 'Wow! I didn't realize I'd come in and look at a whole show of mostly very calm, very classy, and very poetic pictures. Frankly, I thought I'd see dogs with their bottoms hanging off chandeliers or something.' And that's kind of nice when they find it's something else, another side of whatever this creature is. That it's just me."

[michelej1]

[Click for Video of Mick]

http://www.fox10phoenix.com/story/27...-art-and-music

Mick Fleetwood follows a path of art and music


Posted: Dec 09, 2014 8:40 PM PST Updated: Dec 10, 2014 8:29 AM PST

By John Hook, FOX 10 News

PHOENIX (KSAZ) - It's been 16 years since every original member of the legendary group Fleetwood Mac performed and toured together.

They are one of the greatest Rock and Roll bands of all time, selling over 100 million albums.

On Wednesday night, the band will be rocking U.S. Airways Arena, but FOX 10 caught up with drummer and founder of the band, Mick Fleetwood at a gallery in Scottsdale.

Fleetwood's other passion besides music is his photography.

For such an imposing figure, Fleetwood is 64, and he's an incredibly gentle, thoughtful, soft spoken man.

"I still have periods where I take a lot of pictures and think about it a lot, this is the sum of what I've taken," he said.

He's still following the path, in music and photography.

"And then I joined a rock and roll band many years later, and was the boring member of the band who took pictures all day long," he said. Then at night, he would take his place behind a great band and was hardly boring. "We have affected people, and people love our music that still exists."

He says the band is still relevant today for one reason; they all love making music.

"They would truly be doing music with or without the money; it was nothing about being successful," said Fleetwood.

People always ask him whether he'll release something like "Life on the Road with Fleetwood Mac." He says he doesn't think so.

In less than 24 hours from the airing of this story, he will play in front of a sold out crowd. So how does Fleetwood keep his mind on photography?

"I don't get overly thinking about it until I get to the show and get in the complete routine... you would have brought up that I suffer from stage fright, so you've actually triggered me already, I'll be drinking heavily tonight!" he said.

For the first time in 16 years, Christine McVie is back touring with the band so the lineup that produced "Rumours," one of the best selling albums of all time, is back together.

You can watch the full interview with Fleetwood Mac in the player above this story or by going to:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gihBSafVAhE

[michelej1]

[Click for Video of Mick]

http://www.kpho.com/story/27590341/m...tsdale-gallery

Mick Fleetwood displays art in Scottsdale gallery
Posted: Dec 09, 2014 8:02 PM PSTUpdated: Dec 09, 2014 9:27 PM PST

By Lindsey Reiser

SCOTTSDALE, AZ (CBS5) -
You wouldn't expect to see a Rock 'n' Roll legend used to screaming fans meeting folks at a quiet art gallery in Scottsdale, but that's exactly where Mick Fleetwood, founding member of Fleetwood Mac, was Tuesday evening.

The group is scheduled to perform in downtown Phoenix Wednesday evening.

Fleetwood said displaying his art can sometimes be more nerve-wracking than performing on stage.

"I don't write songs, and I don't sing them. I play in a band and it's a lot of work one way or another, but this more personal for me," Fleetwood said.

Before he gets an arena full of people going Wednesday night, he's showing his talents go beyond the stage.

"When I became a drummer, I sort of was doing what we did as a family. We traveled all the time, and I was the boring snapshot-taker in the band," Fleetwood said.

He admits his photographs in the collection Reflections are not what people might expect. They show moments of calm, either in his birthplace of England or his new home in Maui.

"I understand they were probably expecting ladies hanging off chandeliers and things," Fleetwood said.

"The contrast in this photo between the old rusty worn-out truck, and this new burst of super green light from the leaves," said Scottsdale resident Sari Lewis, describing what drew her to the piece she purchased.

She said she's not surprised he chose the Valley as one of his first exhibitions in the states.

"Scottsdale has an awesome gallery district, and we earn and deserve a lot of great art here," Lewis said.

As for his favorite piece? Fleetwood prefers a pair of swans he photographed individually that he said remind him of his parents because swans mate for life.

"In a way, these are my babies," Fleetwood said.


If you'd like to take a look at the pieces, they'll be on display until Thursday at DeRubeis Fine Art of Metal.

Read more: http://www.kpho.com/story/27590341/m...#ixzz3LZ1tENl5

[michelej1]

Mick Fleetwood: Going back again The drummer talks about the reunited Fleetwood Mac and the 'muscle memory' that powers his photography, on view this month in Fort Lauderdale. - See more at:

http://www.southflorida.com/music/sf...,3904595.story

By Phillip Valys, SouthFlorida.com 11:24 a.m. EST, December 11, 2014

Mick Fleetwood picked up his first Contax camera 20 years ago, when he realized that touring the world with Fleetwood Mac started to feel a lot like childhood. Fleetwood's father served in Britain's Royal Air Force, and his family lived "like Gypsies" all over England, southern France and the Mediterranean coast, the drummer writes in his new memoir, "Play On: Now, Then, and Fleetwood Mac." Fleetwood uses a different simile in a recent phone interview, describing touring like "being in the Army, stationed everywhere." Traveling reminded him of his dad's hobby of photographing the family all over Europe. With fellow shutterbug and bassist John McVie, Fleetwood shot various countrysides during concert tours in the 1990s. "My dad was just one of those people who took loads of pictures. It was the curse of the family," Fleetwood recalls with a laugh. "So it was just muscle memory, I think, that it became a natural fit for me. It was just me trying to capture where I was going, and being in a rock 'n' roll band, it was almost like getting posted here, there and everywhere, probably even more than my dad ever was in the Forces."

Evidence of Fleetwood's trading drumbeats for camera clicks appears this month at Fort Lauderdale's Wentworth Gallery, where his show "Reflections: An Exhibition of Original Photographs by Mick Fleetwood" is on display. Fleetwood is scheduled to visit the gallery and meet buyers of his photography on Thursday, Dec. 18, the night before Fleetwood Mac's On With the Tour stop at the BB&T Center in Sunrise. The show falls halfway through the group's first tour in 16 years as the best-known iteration of Fleetwood Mac, the "Rumours"-era lineup, including the recently returned Christine McVie, who left in 1998. -

"The energy [onstage] feels so electric and so vibrant, not only because of the return of the band, but because Christine is making us all complete again," Fleetwood, 67, says. "Not to sound like an old hippie here, but it's like she never left." The "Reflections" photographs span about six years, Fleetwood says, starting with the black-and-white landscapes and long dirt roads of England he discovered while preparing to move his mother to Maui, Hawaii, where he lives. Other color photographs capture the splendor found among Hawaii's hills and mountains, including "The Jungle Takes Back," depicting a blue pickup covered in vines and a rear-windshield sticker that reads, "Keep It Hawaiian." In "Shrooms," he shoots a patch of "little green magic mushrooms" he found on a foothill, which is probably the only drug, he admits, that he hasn't taken over the decades. "I was sitting in the studio one night recording 'Rumours' when we decided to figure out how much coke I had done over the years. We figured if we laid it out end to end, it would be about 7 miles long," Fleetwood says with a laugh. "But no, there's no reference to shrooms in the book."

Fleetwood says the tour, while "grueling" when combined with his appearances and the book tour for his memoir, co-authored with Anthony Bozza, is nothing he can't handle. "Look at someone like B.B. King or Tony Bennett or Elton John, and you'll really have your hair curled as to how much they work," Fleetwood says. "Compared to their really crazy scheduling, we're in good shape. But I'm that model of a person, anyhow. I don't like sitting around, twiddling my thumbs." - See more at:


http://www.southflorida.com/music/sf....cwk3kwMh.dpuf

[michelej1]

Click for video of Mick at the Atlanta Gallery

http://www.cbs46.com/clip/10956388/m...ork-on-display