Beeches - Byway 745 Observatory

A series of graphite and wash observational drawings made as part of an ongoing project Byway 745 Observatory. See Projects. The location is beneath the remains of a once-laid beech hedge. That laid hedge, now grown out, its stock-proof boundary-making function replaced with wire fencing, is a marker between public and private land. The intervention of humans with these trees, the cutting and bending over of their branches in the past has made for their gnarled, knotted appearance and the horizontal emphasis of the exposed roots. This is accentuated by the erosion of the chalk bank over the years due to the hollowing out of the lane below by the passage of human traffic. There is an anthropomorphism present in the work, something I am exploring further, aware of the metaphor of landscape as body, and a vulnerable one at that.