An interdisciplinary artist whose practice explores the embodied experience of cold water and wild swimming, using photography and large-scale cyanotypes. My project explores the difference between the surface and below whilst reflecting my own personal affiliation with water.
Degree show work
My degree showcase attempts to translate my embodied experience of wild and cold-water swimming into image and scale, capturing the movement and fluidity of water. Water can be described as a collaborator in my practice, when I am immersed but also in the production. The camera is taken on the journey of the swim, the cold, the panic and the calm that then follows. It documents snippets of the space between beneath the surface and below. The video that forms part of my degree show gives the viewer an insight into that space, as well as revealing how the images that I later transform into cyanotypes are created.
Full image of 3 m × 1 m Calico fabric cyanotype.
The process
I have swum in a variety of locations throughout the year, including the North Sea, Stoney Cove and Six Hills. The winter swims are the most challenging but the most rewarding, the mental and physical health benefits that cold water exposure can bring has been amazing as part of the process. The photos shown below are a selection of over 1000 photos taken from my swims, the photos are completely unedited and only take on a new life when transformed into cyanotypes.
Swimming in stoney cove, water 6 degrees
The cyanotype process itself holds a crucial role in the production of my work, especially within the large-scale piece I have selected to showcase. It is an unpredictable process that is often left up to chance, meaning that when I immerse the exposed fabric into water to develop it, I am never entirely sure how the image will emerge. There is something in the moment when I plunge the fabric into the water and the image slowly reveals itself that reminds me of the feeling of breaking the surface whilst swimming. This creates a parallel between the act of taking the photographs and the act of producing the final visual experience for the viewer. The way I have pieced the image together before exposure is also purposeful. The visible lines and seams introduce another layer of unpredictability, creating fragmented ‘windows’ within the image that mirror the shifting and unstable nature of water itself. These divisions interrupt the surface in a way that reflects the constant movement and uncertainty experienced whilst submerged.
Picture from my coldest swim, I had to break the ice to enter.
A picture from my favourite place and greatest inspiration: Walberswick, Suffolk.
