Last week, at the rather inspired suggestion of Patricia Singh at the Beaux Arts in London, I took some of my new work down to the beach to photograph it. My companions were Colin Hawkins, who takes most of my photographs, and my friend and studio assistant Niki. Despite fearing the worst in terms of the weather, it turned into a magical morning. Sunny and with only the odd threatening shower, it was also very very windy. Apart from the 'official' photographs which can be seen on my website, this one is my favourite as it captures Niki and I using all our body weight to hang on to one of Colin's lights. I feel it captures the reality of the daftness, hard work and friendship behind the final calm images.
As soon as Patricia came up with the idea I realised it was spot on. And in some ways obvious too, to take the objects, most of which were found near 'the sea', back to 'the sea'. Aesthetically it made sense. But when I saw the objects in their 'natural' setting, something else happened too, something which I can't quite pin down yet in my thoughts. Perhaps something to do with wanting some of the work to stay outside - to live in that vast space. Interestingly, my aunt Elizabeth sent me a postcard this week of the day mark at Baltimore in Ireland. A similar tall structure to the one in this photograph but I think about 20m high, whitewashed stone. Beautiful. And at a scale that no sculptor could help but covet!
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