Subject: Surreal

While I was creating this picture, the phrase ‘Basso Profondo’ kept cropping up in my mind. The phrase, as a title, was inappropriate for the image, but I preferred ‘Basso Ensemble’ . The double bass was in the shop window of Cooke’s Pianos on St. Benedict’s St. (no longer there). I took a couple of photos, but settled on a side view, to avoid the shadow and reflection I was casting. Later at home, I noticed the sun streaming across the coffee table and remembered a speculative shot I took of the wine glass the year previously. With those two images together, I was looking to fill the top part of the frame. I thought some clouds….but found the clock tower. It is in Eaton Park, by the model boating lake. Yes the dial is back to front! I had to reverse the image, to accommodate the light direction.

Here I am once again on Cromer Pier with a glass of wine (alcoholic, definitely!), before continuing to Wiveton Hall on a Sunday afternoon. This is a favoured spot, sheltered from the wind and warmed by the sun. The table casts a wonderful shadow on the planking. As usual, I worked through possible marriage/narratives to fit the scene. I eventually came across the prow of a boat I had photographed years ago. It was being scraped down to be repainted. The angel is a feature on a college building in Cambridge. This is one of a pair who face away from each other, under the eaves on the corner of the building.

There is a meadow at Wiveton Hall which hosts a ‘Glamping’ opportunity during the summer. It’s composed of a row of bell tents with mod-cons and a shower and toilet facility on-site. I photographed the tents just after they were erected before occupancy. They looked extraordinary in the evening sun. The picture started to come together after I introduced a photo of the net curtain in my bedroom, with the way the sun slanted across the window. Next came an old photograph of a classic American car, which was part of a collection being exhibited on Yarmouth seafront. The last component was the chain and padlocks, which I saw on a gate at Blakeney. I thought it created a symmetry with the car roof and the curtain. I toned the car and curtains blue/purple in keeping with the shadow on the tents.

I visited the Norfolk and Suffolk Aviation Museum in Flixton, Suffolk, and came away with a wealth of photographs from the exhibits there. One example is the very early aeroplane on display, which was suspended from the ceiling in one of the hangars on the site. Behind it was the metal panelled interior wall. As you can see, I’ve distorted the image to give the illusion of forward motion. As usual I was looking for something to compliment the primary image. Eventually I introduced the splay of canoes that were on the river, here in Norwich. I added the clouds at the top to replace the water in the original photo.

Walking along Hunstanton Beach on one of the first sunny days of the year, the crowds were out enjoying themselves. There is a funfair section between the seafront and Seagate Rd. I took a load of photographs, especially the Helter Skelter and the Orbiter. I had a perverse idea of placing the Orbiter on top of the Helter Skelter. Then came the wooden planking of Cromer Pier, which was just drying out from the rain. Playing around, I turned the photo sideways and realised what a dramatic effect it had on the composition. The title came at the end.

This is another interior shot of the indoor marketplace that I used in the picture titled ‘Fantastic Too Two’. The workman in the cherrypicker was helping to dismantle some steel tubular stanchions in Lowestoft. It was the structural frame of a commercial building that was being demolished. The crossed tubular supports looked quite stark. I have included another two photos of them to create a crisscrossed pattern, suspended in the surreal and very ethereal setting. I applied a Paint Daubs filter to soften the picture and give it a dreamlike quality.

The canoes were moored together on the River Wensum, at a landing site by Elm Hill in Norwich. I was looking down on them from the river walkway above. These are two separate photographs I took. They are a ‘Pub & Paddle’ enterprise, which gives the public the opportunity to go up and down the river to visit waterside pubs. The dramatic building interior is a newly built indoor market, which is replacing the old jumble of stalls that have been on the Market Place in Yarmouth for years. The sun streaming through the horizontally slatted windows, and casting light on the wooden panelling was fantastic. I distorted the image to give movement and applied a Poster Edge filter to accentuate the grain in the wood.

I always take a camera with me and photograph anything that grabs my attention. I can guarantee that every twenty photos I take, one might be used in one of my pictures, however insignificant. Here is a good example; a gate padlocked to the entrance of a piece of overgrown wasteland. I liked the flaked painted gate, with another rusted ‘sunrise’ configured gate behind. I cut away the spaces between and considered what to put behind. The sky became the working result, but was a bit boring. Then I came up with the semi- transparent bubble which I created from scratch. I duplicated the original and sized the copies. This is something that came out of nowhere, and I was exhilarated by the result because of the journey I experienced, and the sense of achievement achieved ,….the title followed….reminding me of a time my sister-in-law and I travelled a few miles to have lunch at a certain restaurant, only to be confronted with a barrier and a sign reading “We are closed today”, without it being apparent which day.