Wayside

Many hours over many days last year were spent wandering around my various locales, a much loved activity which became the backbone of a series of drawings and embroideries which I hope to publish in some format over the coming months. As a relatively recent transplant to the big city from a more rural origin I've been interested in exploring themes of home and displacement through landscape and my environment. It's easy to feel lost in such a big place, but as I kept meandering through London, slowing down to drink it all in I was ultimately uplifted to find elements of home everywhere I looked. Nowhere was this more evident than by miniaturizing my viewpoint, right down to the weeds I found along the wayside, growing through cracks in the arches and on small wasteland areas that burst into meadows for the summer months.

The drawings that comprise the series 'Wayside' are a mixture of landscapes built by layers of textures, details of places regularly overlooked, and small studies of botanical samples I collected on my research. The explorative nature of this project led to a slightly non-linear approach to my drawing, recording more abstract notations of the plants and structures I discovered in my walks, and reflecting the meandering and circular nature of my research.

I find the intricate and immersive patterns to be found by looking at patches of meadows and such to be endlessly fascinating, and I'm sure that I could continue researching and recording these worlds forever! There are a few more drawings from this sequence on my portfolio site, and I'm hoping to make some prints and a book from the images soon.