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WILDGOOSE
for my imaginary followers

Another day into the Seaside Project


This time Burnham on Sea, and Brean, just down from Weston-Super-Mare. I got there at low tide, a time when it's dangerous to swim due to either the racing tide or the treacherous mud and quicksand, so again the children have to make do without being able to play in the sea.

Unlike Clevedon, which was overcast and about 15C cooler, Burnham on Sea and Brean are rendered with an entirely different colour palette, which is going to make editing and sorting a bit of an issue in the future, but great to see England looking decidedly Mediterranean.




I am somewhat startled by Bristol and its inhabitants. To use the local parlance, there is a very chilled vibe here, and barring one occasion (more later), I've been allowed to work, and when I've needed to ask, I've been encouraged. For this I have happily traded images. But it's rare that I have to ask as the way I shoot, in general, is to frame a shot and then to allow someone to walk into it, or through it. This gives me a sort of permit, because unlike me

taking a picture of someone, that some one is walking into my picture. It's a subtle difference I know, but one that is important to me because to be frank, I'm a coward. I tried one day to go all Joel Meyerowitz on this lovely city and it didn't work. I had a run in with someone who thought I needed to ask for permission, and... well, it didn't go well and I walked away with my pride a little damaged, completely unable to continue to work that afternoon. I learned my lesson. I've now reverted to my usual M.O. and I'm happy again. Fortunately, most of the time organic matter isn't really necessary.


My Fuji X- Pro3 continues to impress. I have now, I think, finally got it set up in a manner that I can just pick it up and work with it. So happy am I that I picked up another so I can work in the way I've worked forever. Two bodies, two lenses. This gives me (obviously) twice the options and it's helpful for me to pivot around my most commonly used lens, with a longer or wider lens on the second camera, depending on where I am working and what my mood is. Having shot Clevedon a week or so ago I have now settled on a project, to document these lovely English seaside resorts, with their evocative names: Westward Ho, Lyme Regis, Budleigh Salterton, Skegness, Cleethorpes.



Ok, I'll admit that this isn't just a commentary project, it's primarily an exercise in composition, and there's no easier place to do this than on the coast, where the horizons are distant and flat, leaving not much background clutter, and the act of composition is more Rothko than Constable.

But still, there is something fascinating about the British on holiday, and I'm not talking about, or interested in the drinking and clubbing culture, or the gravitational pull toward familiar fast food in far flung places. I'll leave that kind of scathing commentary to other photographers. I'm more interested in the vernacular; the surface of these places. These resorts are nostalgia factories. When I was a child, coming from a near landlocked shire in the north of England, a seaside resort was an utterly exotic, sensation filled experience. So many elements of each of our family holidays is etched in my memory, and these treasures resonate achingly in places like Clevedon.



Technically, Clevedon isn't even a seaside resort. It squats on the edge of the Bristol Channel, the River Severn's muddy brown exit into the Atlantic. It's not a place you'd go if you'd want the pristine sandy beaches or wild cliff top walks of nearby Devon and Cornwall. Most likely it's a place you'd go because you can afford it and you can get there easily. It has a uniquely British feel, and conforms with so much of the country's seaside resort culture:

a preponderance of bed and breakfast hotels, amusement arcades, fish and chip shops,e cream parlours, a pier, a promenade... Things to do and ways to keep the kids occupied if the weather isn't all that great, or the sea is either too cold or too rough, all of which are to be expected and hedged against.



I love places like these, and the people who come to them. They are unpretentious holiday destinations for families who are blessed with an admirable lack of self consciousness, and I can't help but feel warmly toward them because the familiarity of these places is burnt into my consciousness, so I can still relate to this very particular holiday experience, and do so very happily.


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