So Monday started off feeling like I was at the bottom of a mountain and unsure how to navigate my path....the thing is I want to create new work as well as honour the research and the development process involved in my ACE grant (to learn, use & record traditional and non traditional means of weather proofing photo stones & concrete in all manner of outdoor situations). To make this happen I have hired, as you may know an old pig shed as a workspace on a farm close to where I live - which is also at the heart of the village and its community.
If you know Suffolk at all it is a flat landscape with expansive skies. My surrounding landscape, stretches out into endless agricultural fields, that really 'get the weather' a good starting place a a testing ground.
So.... on Tuesday I rooted around : ) the edges of the farm and found a flint or two.
In the meantime, I met three brothers that work on the farm and have done all their lives, although one has now retired. They kindly leant me some old photographs and I returned to the pig shed and went about merging and bonding their imagery to the fabric of their surroundings.
The photograph itself was taken in the 1960s from the farmyard looking towards the farm house - the top image is of Peter carefully holding the flint - he is both the gardener for the farmhouse as well as farm worker.
The image below is of John holding the original photograph that he took himself - he is actually a keen photographer.
Other images are now coming to light from other villagers.....both old and new - I am feeling an urge to document my part of rural Suffolk and gather these personal documents - make new relics and return them to the landscape and in turn observe their ageing and demise....so the journey has begun, I have found my footing and I am looking backwards to move forwards.
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