The OFFSIDE Bar and Gallery is basically a collaboration between friends. Mark Leech has been a freelance sports photographer for 30 years, working from various premises in Islington. My brother Lorcan Devine and myself are probably better known for the Old Red Lion Theatre Pub on the Angel.
Mark has been very smart with his professional career in that he has managed to combine two passions; Photography and sport. We combined ours: pubs and theatre. We felt that we were onto something! The OFFSIDE bar is really an extension of that.
In 2001 the OFFSIDE Sports Photo Agency was born. This was an attempt to organise ourselves to survive in the very competitive world of sports photography. Our major competitor is John Paul Getty for christsake!
And we were a few guys and a dog working from a freezing office off the Essex Road. As the industry moved out of the Dark Room into the brave new digital dawn, skill and artistry were replace by "route-one" technology. Young kids with expensive cameras, machine-gunning sports fixtures on auto focus. Ask them who was on the team sheet, and they would go blank.
What does the agency do? It shoots and sells sports photos to newspapers and magazines, both in the UK and abroad. We sell "Live" pictures, that is, those shot today for immediate publication in a newspaper or onto a website. We also distribute other agencies' photos into the UK. We cover all sports, but our speciality is certainly Football and Rugby. The agency has full Premier League Accreditation which underlines the respect that the agency has within the industry. The other aspect of the agency is the archive. This is where the real joy is! The origins of the OFFSIDE archive go back to Mark's photography from the late 70's and grows exponentially into the 80's and 90's and into the 21st century. It totals over a million images, 50,000 of which are online. Irresistible!
Most notably for the agency, we also distribute in the UK the photos of the L'Equipe/Presse Sports agency in Paris. This is the pre-eminent sports archive in the world, dating back to 1895! Truly astonishing. The British may have invented every modern sport worth playing, but L'Equipe were there to take the pictures. It's easy to forget in a revisionist British sort of way that the World Cup, The European Nations, the European Cup and indeed the Modern Olympics all started in Paris. They also play amazing Rugby! It is a constant source of pride that L'Equipe, who are still a privately owned family company that base all their publications around intelligent text and inspiring images, choose OFFSIDE to represent them in the UK. When they need a photo of their favourite sons playing in the UK, they ask Mark first.
Our main niche is, and always will be, shooting on film. There will always be room for quality. Just to explain that shooting on Film in today's professional sports photo industry is a rarity. The speed, cost and surety (and limitations!)of digital photography now rule the roost. We embrace new technology, but it always comes with a down-side. It may level the playing field, but the intriguing point is, that maybe lost with some, is that as the technology improves, so does the the ability of talented people to differentiate their work with it. Do we shoot on digital? Of course we do. Can we hold our own? Absolutely. But come into our bar and look at the huge image of Jean Robic taken during the 1947 "Tour de France" and talk about the virtues of digital Photography. There is a place for everything, but most of our Dj's spin more vinyl than CD's, and Mark still pines for his 8 track.
We wanted to open a Gallery. A shop window that would be dedicated exclusively to Sports photography. We don't think there's one in London and probably not in the UK. We're not really gallery people. They can be very boring and to be honest, a bit arsey. We decided to play safe and stick to what we know. To open a bar with a Gallery in it! That seemed to play more to our strengths! With quality plasmas and state-of-the-art projection and an upstanding Landlord, and an understated chef with excellent food (proper portions, priced honestly), and Good Beer and great photography!
This gave us one big headache. None of us have ever really liked any sports bar that we have ever been in! We needed to do things differently. To use the photography to create the right atmosphere that like minded people would appreciate and enjoy. We hit on an idea: paint it all green and disguise it as an Irish Bar! We were soon found out and are still being found out by people who unashamedly like their sport and have been looking for the right atmosphere in which to enjoy it. Friendly and welcoming, not partisan and intimidating. People who celebrate the winning team and commiserate with the losers, buy each other a drink and talk about the photography on the wall. At last London has a bar where anyone who has a passion for any sport and any team can feel at home.It is not by mistake that almost as many ladies frequent the bar as guys. They talk more sense about sport anyway. But they do love the Loos!
We intend to run the Gallery like the Theatre at the Old Red Lion. Have a new production every month or so and keep the images fresh and changing. We want to display our own work, but also to invite the best Sports Photographers in the world to exhibit. The response that we have had to this has already been amazing. This gives them the opportunity to exhibit the work that they feel has been their career best. Not the saleable image or the convenient shot that meets the photo editors deadline. Incredible enough, many have not been given the opportunity or freedom to do this outside of formal photo competitions.
We will combine current themed exhibitions with individual work and multiple contributors with book launches and events. We opened in a panic to make the Euro'04 finals and hosted our first exhibition: "Henri Delanuay: The history of the Euro Nations Cup". This was followed by an amazing celebration of the "Tour de France", and then "Going for Gold" which displayed images from the L'Equipe Olympic archive that were seen in the UK for the first time. In the future we are planning exhibitions on the Six Nations, and the Ashes, and from names that you will recognise from the photo credit lines of your favored rag. Oh, yes and in December we will solve that perennial problem of what to get dad for Christams!
Our Flagship Exhibition for the Autumn of 2004 is also our most important one: "OFFSIDE by Mark Leech: 30 Years of Football Photography." Time to blow Mark's trumpet, and why not? This exhibition will explain exactly what OFFSIDE is all about better than I ever could do in words. Pop in and enjoy it. You will understand Mark's passion for football, and appreciate the humour in his work and his exceptional eye for sports action photography.
Who said that you should never combine work and pleasure? Rubbish!
Damien Devine
October '04
BAR REVIEWS
SKY PREVIEW MAGAZINE - FEBRUARY 2006 issue
BETTER BUSINESS - THE OFFSIDE BAR
"PICTURE PERFECT"
"Quality and perfection seem to be the buzzwords for Richard and Offside. The staff are clearly getting it right because the bar has had unlimited praise in reviews. The approach taken by the management is simple, almost common sense. Yet the fact that they are so reluctant to compromise on anything means that it's one of the best places to watch a match in the capital...."
Londonist Loves..........The Offside Bar & Gallery
"...you get a very clear feel for the ethos behind the bar, which is combining a passion for sports photography and good bars with a desire to create a space for sports fans to watch big games in a non-partisan atmosphere. The Offside Bar & Gallery is less about what colours you wear and more about celebrating good sport. It rocks. And so we urge anyone who takes their sport-watching seriously to go check it out. You won't be disappointed."
Alex Dawson, www.Londonist.com, June 2005