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Aerial Atlas of Ancient Britain

screen print called Tree of Life

Stone circles, hill figures and rock art generally have fascinated me for years. That’s why I was so drawn to the drone photographs of these artefacts, taken by David Abram, when they began to appear on Instagram. I’ve just received my copy of his Aerial Atlas of Ancient Britain. It doesn’t disappoint. The photography is stunning.

Each picture is stitched together from multiple drone photos into a single high resolution image. The image below, drawn from his website, is a good example. It shows White Sheet Hill, part of the Stourhead estate, in southern Wiltshire. On the hill there is a neolithic causeway camp and barrows, an Iron Age hill fort, and it is traversed by a Roman road.

Without these photographs, the only way to see the full extent of these ancient places is via maps and plans. The simplification inherent in their production creates a strong graphic image, which I find appealing. On the ground, they don’t reveal themselves in the same way. The attraction of the images, for me anyway, comes from the way they put these bold, graphic shapes back in their landscape settings, with all the rich and subtle colours that implies. In addition, many of these are in remote places, inaccessible to a 76-year-old with mobility problems, so they offer a vicarious experience to complement the data in reference books.

I’ve used references to neolithic art in my own work many times, and I think the Aerial Atlas will be a source of inspiration for some time.

Examples in my work

These tiny collagraphs draw on the idea of stone circles, for example.

These draw on hill figures. These are proof prints from a project derailed by the COVID pandemic.

This sketch, manipulated digitally, is based on craters, but contains the same archetypal round shapes.

Image from sketchbook with idea for 'Martian Landscape' image
Craters

I have a theory, which began with art, but applies equally well to the constructions in the Aerial Atlas, that there are certain archetypal shapes with which we have a physiological as much as an aesthetic response. The obvious ones are of course line and circle/disc, but also spirals and labyrinths and probably others. The job of the artist is to tap into that physiological response. David Abram’s photos do that, I think. They expose the ‘complex simplicity’ of the shapes our ancestors created on the land, never seeing those shapes themselves, but somehow reacting to them.

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Accepted for publication – again!

After the last post, about my published story, I’m pleased to say another short story has been accepted for publication in an anthology. More on that when it is published, some time in the new year. Even more pleasing, a publisher has taken a novel of mine to look at. That’s a bit of a long shot, obviously, but I hope to hear before the end of the year.

Caryatids Whitburn Hall
Caryatids – one of my photos taken in Whitburn, South Tyneside about 1975

In the meantime, you can read several other short pieces on my personal pages here.

The photo is now available from the shop. Click on the image to see the details.

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Fat Bottomed Girls

I generally want to concentrate on my hand pulled prints in this blog, but this digital print is one of my most popular pieces. I think it captures bright, cheerful, sunny days by the sea, just like the work of Beryl Cook and Donald McGill. I’ll be adding it to my Etsy shop soon.

digital print from photgraphs
Fat Bottomed Girls – digital print