I hope all is well there.
I am pleased to let you know that my new book Form is now available from my online store, where further details about the book and special offers can be found. All orders are normally shipped within 5 days.
Form is a hardback book with 84 pages and features writing and photographs relating to my work in the south Wales Valleys.
Double page spreads from Form - Monuments to Coal (above), End of the Row (below)
Form consists of two distinct elements, the book plus a series of audio episodes (see outline below). The audio episodes will be available soon and I’ll send you notification of how you can access them (they will be available at no cost). Please share with anyone who you think might be interested.
There are events and features relating to Form currently being developed - I will keep you updated. I hope you enjoy both the book and the audio, I have really enjoyed putting them together.
Many thanks and bye for now…
Form is a gathering of selected fragments reflecting aspects of the development of what became my long-term project photographing in the Valleys. These fragments include glimpses of motivations and politics, elements of research and methodologies, brief encounters and formative relationships, and not least the necessary persistence needed to develop and complete projects. For those familiar with my work, Form may offer unexpected insights into the development of the broader project. For those who don’t or who are starting out on a journey of their own, these fragments may provide some pointers for approaching the development, completion and dissemination of personal projects.
In the latter part of Form, I reflect on my earliest work relating to the Valleys and how being introduced to the book American Photographs by Walker Evans not only inspired me, but almost led me to give up photography altogether. This was a period where I started to think about the relationship between photographs and time, and how photographs had the capacity to record aspects of contemporary society. At the end of Form, I look to the future and contemplate the likelihood of photographing further projects in the Valleys. Since 2010 I have increasingly made photographs in west Wales having been a regular visitor there for many years. In 2021 I moved to the Carmarthenshire hills above the Teifi Valley, finally moving away from the place I have known so intimately. It is this distancing of time and place that makes Form timely in terms of looking back at the work produced over thirty years.
There are two distinctly different, yet related, elements to Form. One is the book with each of the chapters relating to a particular series of photographs. Each chapter is illustrated with photographs from that series along with images of associated ephemera. The other element is the series of audio episodes – each episode contains a chapter of the book read by me; plus, additional audio pieces made on locations relevant to the chapters. The book and the audio series complement each other, but equally, each readily stands as a fully formed presentation in its own right.
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