A British photographer hunts the rich on the wing
by Judith Newman

Published in Modern Photography 1989

If you want to know what God thinks of money,’’ Dorothy Parker once said,’’just look at the people he gave it to.’’
Few have looked as piercingly as the British society photographer Dafydd Jones. Every night Jones; camera testifies to the drama and, well, the silliness of the British social arena, where the upper echelons do what they do best - keep the rest of the world at bay.
Jones does not strive for postcard perfect poses of the gentry at play-those graceful shots of princess Diana with her brood tow-headed heirs. Such mythologizing is for Ralph Lauren ads and Lord Lichfield, the Queen’s cousin and unofficial court phographer. No, this grandson of a Welsh coal miner snaps the aristos with thier pants figuratively, and sometimes literally, down. And, cricky, they love it.
‘’The English have a sense of humor about themselves’’ says Jones, whose caught-on -the-wingwork appears regularly in the social arbiters Tatler and Harpers & Queen and has been copiedby such American magazines as Vanity fair, W and Spy. ‘’They see these pictures as caricatures that capture something about them.” Indeed, Jones’ work is more in line with the satiric illustrations of William Hogarth and spy, than the society photographs of Cocil Beaton and Bill Brandt.
What Jones often captures is that rare moment of utter unself-consciousness in people trained never to let thier guard down. It is often not a pretty sight, but he says, “I’ve never had anyone tell me they were offended by my work. In fact, some of the people who’ve had the most unflattering photos published then ask me to do their daughters’ weddings.’’
Jones speaks haltingly, his voice barely above a whisper. Dressed for lunch in khakis and chamois shirt, he looks like a graduate student younger than his 30 years. We chat in a toney French restaurant - Too toney perhaps for even a successful freelancer, who has the support of a wife and two children, to have chosen.
At Jones’ insistence his friend David Kirke, a writer and self-proclaimed adventurer joins in. Kirke is the founder of the Dangerous Sports Club, a group of Oxford and Cambridge bloods who invent thier own ‘’sports.’’ ‘’We catapault ourselves off cranes, jump off bridges attached to bungies (elastic straps), that sort of thing.’’
It’s soon clear why Kirke is along, Jones hates to explain his work, something the voluble daredevil is the only to happy to do for him.
‘’Lady Melchett called Dafydd ‘The Invisible Man,’’ says Kirke. ‘’He just blends in with the scenery.’’
‘’I just try to wear whatever everyone else is wearing,’’ adds Jones. ‘And I’m not loaded down with equipment, so i’m not too intrusive.’’
Less interested in gadgetry than in the final print, Jones generally works with one auto camera, an olympus 35 RC. Occasionally he’ll use a leica M4, ‘’which is useful because you can change the lenses, which you can’t do with the Olympus.” He has used the most basic point-and-shoots (including a Kodak Instamatic), but thinks they’re generally too slow for this kind of work.
Jones shoots five or six rolls of Tri-X a night- and claims to take only one or two pictures a month that have any artistic merit. He’s used the Kodak film since he started photography eight years ago. “I tried T-max, but i just didn’t like it. And besides, Tri-X is cheaper.” Jones developes his own negatives in Ilford ID 11, a solution he switched to after “Kodak changed the mix-up formula D76,” Jones rates his Tri-X at 400 when using a flash and at 1250 for indoor available-light shots. “i quite like Tri-X because you can up-rate (push it).’’ When he “up-rates” film Jones switches to Acufine developer.
For flash work Jones uses the compact Starblitz 2001, which he holds off camera, bouncing light off the ceiling.
“I don’t think it’s particularly important what kind of equipment you use,”he says. “There are cheap Russian cameras that are as good for my purposes.” When submitting work to a magazine, Jones will edit his contact sheets and send in only those shots he considers worthwhile. An assistant prints the pictures for him.
One of Jones’ most successful projects is a series of photographs of people asleep at parties. “I most enjoy taking pictures of people when they are completly unaware.’’ Dawn is the Invisible Man’s favorite time to shoot his subjects. “they are usually too spaced out to care that you are photographing them.”
The allure of Jones’ work goes beyond the aristocratic faces that appear in his pictures, but it’s appeal is still hard to define. Of course Kirke, whose admiration for Jones grows visibly in inverse proportion to the level of a second bottle of Bordeaux, wants very badly to try. “England is a place of mirrors, where everyone is trying to catch thier reflection in someone else. Dafydd’s work is about this process-about people watching other people watching them.” Jones, exercising his third Armagnac, knocksthe discourse down a couple of pegs. “I just snap it when it looks right,” he sighs.
Jones comes by his modesty honestly. He trained in fine arts at the fine arts at the Winchester School of Art, painting huge abstract oils. At 22, with paintings not exactly zipping out of his studio, he took a job as a strolling photographer at a holiday camp. (Holiday camps are peculiarly British institution. The nearest American equivilant would be a cross between Catskill’s resort and Camp Pendleton) It was while photographing contests for Mr Tarzans, Gorgeous Grandmas and lovely legs that Jones developed an abiding distaste for colour photography. “People only want to look at the pretty colours. It’s distracting, and usually takes away from the subject.”
After six months he moved to Oxford, where he begun photographing the rather festive goings-on at the University dining clubs. There’s an exuberance, lightly seasoned with desperation, in these early photos that would have done Scott Fitzcrald proud.
His Oxford pictures won second prize in a Times of London contest (first prize went to a man who now sells insurance, Jones says)and national attention. He’s not looked back.
Jones hopes he will not always be known as a society photographer. It seems strange to him that he, a quiet family man who never goes to parties on his own, has made his name chronicling the social steeplechase.
The check comes for lunch. the dare-devil Kirke does not hazard reaching for it. Jones picks it up and floats it casually in my direction. it totals nearly 100 newly resurgent pounds sterling. “I’m sure your magazine can take care of it,” he says smiling sweetly, dreamily. I am utterly disarmed. Of course, I pay.
The Invisible Man has struck again.