A New Project/Journey...
I’ve spent the last 10 years or so working on a long term project called ‘Out of the Ordinary’ — a journey though everyday Scotland. I was seeking to explore and celebrate the ordinary in the landscape, find interest in the overlooked. It has been an incredibly rewarding project, as a journey for me personally and photographically, as much as a physical one.
It’s never easy finishing any project, deciding when to leave it be. And, on making that decision, I found myself asking what next?
My method of working always tends to be to create work and see what develops from it — I seldom start out with a tightly defined concept. I choose a subject or idea that I’m interested in then just make work, trying to be as open as possible to the project moving in new directions.
I grew up on the east coast of the Scottish Highlands — my horizon was that of the North Sea, often grey but ever changing. It’s a body of water that has interested me for some time, imagining my links with others who share it’s shores. I’m fascinated by our relationship to the sea, and how it affects people and their communities.
So, over the next 5 or 10 years I’ve decided to travel around the North Sea — making work in Scotland, England, France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany, Denmark and Norway. For now I plan to just create work, reacting to the places I visit & people I encounter, and see how the project develops over time.
I began work on the project last year, exploring along the east coast of Scotland and England. I’m gradually building up a body of images, a sample of which you can see here…
