Having done some travelling, I began to become aware of the actual journey as being visually interesting. It is a time in which, people tend to switch off their minds, and go into another world, with thoughts coming in and out of focus. The pace of thinking changes, as you are propelled through nameless, in-between places, that barely enter your consciousness. Focusing on the window, the thin membrane separating, and protecting you from the outside world, this series relates to the views almost in terms of memory. This protective and seemingly impenetrable surface actually has a certain fragility about it. The surface is merely glass, which can shatter and ultimately be destroyed. It was important to eliminate any visual reference, or interjection, from the inside of the vehicle, except the transparent surface of the window, as I did not want it to be instantly recognisable where or what is being shown. The surface of the window becomes an important device to distract the viewer from the actual landscape, and focuses the attention on the seemingly insignificant, the non-event. The ambiguity of the images, confuses the viewer so that they should become aware of their, “own activity of looking, to an awareness and sort of hyperconsciousness of visual perception.” (Uta Barth in interview with Sheryl Conkelton, 1996).
This work creates an impression of silence - I did not want sound of any kind, other than the unavoidable - I wanted the viewer to be aware of the quietness, but not as negative feeling, rather a calming escapism. This work is predominantly a series of landscapes, but also deals with duration of time, (the fleeting moment) and place, or non-place.
