Portal

2022

Photographic print on paper on di-bond aluminium

Image 100 x 150cm

edition: 

1 x supersize 150cm x 100cm 

Silver wood tray frame

The Goodwin Sands are so full of history, I wanted to create an artwork that suggests the sands as a way of stepping back in time:  a portal to the past.

I travelled out to The Sands at dusk in an old SAS speedboat, taking with me a meter high mirror. Jumping into chest high water, myself and fellow artists, Loren Beven and Michele Turriani, waded ashore. I had 20 mins to set up and photograph the mirror. The mirror reflected the brightest part of the sky, where the sun was setting, and it created the idea of a magical doorway to step through, back in time.

Then tragedy struck. The boat engine cut out when it came to collect us and it drifted away, leaving us alone to consider our fate as the sun was setting. We did not know what to do. Would we become history? Thankfully, the engines were fixed before darkness fell and we swam out, to be hauled back onto the boat.

 It is the most memorable photograph I have ever taken.

Note: Photographer Murray Fredericks is the master of mirrors in landscapes and I owe the inspiration for this work to him.