This digest revels in the in-between, the transitional, the presence of absence. My camera with its dials and knobs and sharp focus has taken me into the blur of things. It has taught me that because things can't be measured it doesn't mean that it isn't there. The spirit of things, the essence of our places is as real as my shutter button.
I’ve photographed many projects where artists, artisans and conservators have helped restore—and sometimes transform—the memory of an age, an epithet, a story, a turning point, through a building, a memorial or a piece of art.
Despite the epic scale of the moorland, it is the smallest thing - a chapel - that animates the landscape.
And then, without warning - a chiaroscuro. The landscape delivers its crescendo: the spire of the Marble Church piercing the firmament from a brace of gargoyles, that project above a dip in the distant Clwydian hills.
I think it’s because there’s a clarity of message here - a kind of truth that asks nothing of you. Not the sort that needs proving or defending, but one that is simply known, absorbed.
I think of how fortunate we are to have these places. I’m grateful for the spaces that engage us, that challenge the mundanity of the everyday.
Then, instinctively, I reach into my bag. My fingers graze the edge of my sketchbook. It’s such a comforting feeling - that first touch tingles because of the depth of its meaning. Should I?
Amidst the medieval ridge and furrow are lumps and bumps that mark events from the past, reverberating through this place. It was at Repton that a great Viking army wintered in 873 AD under the leadership of Ivar the Boneless. The lumps and bumps are the boundaries of their camp.
The weight of history here is a press. I am so taken in by what I see that I sit down on the cold slab to absorb it. This is a place that has held fast in the eddying tides and swells of chaotic times.
As I sketch, the people of this town come and go – their conversations rise and fall. The bar staff change shifts; time dissolves, and outside, the timber framing stands unmoved.