Shot Rock, White Lea Farm, Easington

I have been really stuck with how to take my White Lea Farm at Easington project forward, but at last I have found the right voice.

I started this project a couple of years ago, but after an initial rush of enthusiasm I found that I wasn’t moving forward. My usual style of subtle coloured landscapes showing details in their context (using wide angle lenses) just wasn’t right. Something about the light and the subtle creamy yellow shades of limestone wasn’t right and I was trying to enforce my style on a place that was trying to tell me something different.

Infrequent trips made little progress, but I began to feel that the shades of the limestone were what I needed to concentrate on, and monochrome was probably the answer to this. I guess the monochrome image is also a reaction to the strongly coloured past projects by other photographers in this area, not saying they were wrong, I liked them very much, but this isn’t what I felt the space was telling me. A major part of this project is also to show the regeneration that has occured in this area, that the Co. Durham coast is worth visiting so gritty documentary photography is out. And my desire to show the eroding effect of the sea on the fragile limestone also needed addressing.

So I visited once in a while, thinking, looking, listening, looking some more. And to be honest the inspiration wasn’t mine. I’ve seen a lot of good monochrome photography recently including Ansel Adams and Josef Hoflehner and the mastery of their craft and style have had a big effect on me. So, here I am at a style for the project, dark graphic silhouettes abstracting the spaces amazing architecture and soft toned seas, always moving, always eating away at the coast.

What is interesting looking back, is that the first few times I visited my gut instinct was to make colour photographs in a similar graphic style with very soft water symbolising the power of the water. This was instinctive, and it was only when I started thinking about the project too much that I lost my way stylistically. Somedays, I wish I had a brain that worked, or I at least knew to ignore it!

The prints are a lot better than the web image and I still have a bit of work to do in refining the print and subtler tones in the rock, but at last, I think I have found the right voice for White Lea Farm.

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