A photographer, filmmaker and sound artist for whom issues of climate change are implicit, mapping his surroundings using sound and vision with a variety of approaches.
I am a photographer, filmmaker and sound artist, primarily in the fine art gallery site-specific arenas.
Working mainly in the landscapes of Suffolk Coastal where I live, the concept of time is crucial to my ideas, exchanging the classic definition of photography as a series of instant glimpses of the world in which we live, to a personal definition of ‘space-time’. The issues of climate change are implicit rather than explicit in my work. Working during the light of day and the darkness of night, I 'map' my surroundings using sound and vision with a variety of approaches. By creating a field of vision for a recording to take place, be it the manipulated time of clouds moving or a series of light drawings at night, I harness the elements such as the wind or the sea. The photograph or moving image is the evidence of an 'event' that has taken place, a ‘performance’ that even I myself cannot see in its entirety. Working collaboratively with writers and poets, these become the frames for my FotoFilms, where I use image, sound/music and text/voice to translate these ‘maps’ into a personal observation of my chosen surroundings.
Where I live I see the evidence of the impact of climate change in the form of coastal erosion or the changing, sometimes unpredictable, weather patterns which are often a discrete presence in my work.
My most recent work, Float, was created during the forced isolation of the Covid 19 lockdown when the issues of both being out of control of one’s own daily life and the compulsion to maintain control was and is a daily struggle.
My line of vision shifted from the eye-level landscape transformed by the pandemic to the open skies and the constant movement of clouds. The distant view, towards the horizon and upwards to space transports us from the close detail of real danger and uncertainty to a sense of freedom. The physical and emotional connection with the natural world brought a new sense of what is it like to be a creative individual, to be one sentient being in relation to the vastness of the atmosphere surrounding our planet.