Mapping the Landscape

21st SeptemberI had a fantastic morning today. I rode my bike along the canal following through to Brindleyplace, home of the Ikon gallery, sealif centre and the NIA. It was an enjoyable ride, I didn’t measure gow many miles or how long as i just took my time stopping frequently to take photos and take it all in. I watched a couple of canal boats navigateing the locks and had a really interestig chat with the owner of a canal boat called the Cheese Boat, it had come all the way from London for a couple of canal boat events in the Birmingham area and he’s now on his way back down south. It took him the best part of 5 weeks to get up here, a leisurely pace he informed me. It was interesting to hear his views of the graffiti that is prevalent around the Birmingham canals (and I daresay throughout the country) He has no tolerance for it at all and thinks it is mindless destruction of our history and heritage and he was clearly angry and passionate about the subject. I spoke about some of the graffiti being art but he pointed out that a huge majority of the graffiti was names (tags) which he didn’t class as art. It would be interesting to get peoples views on graffitti, are the tags art? From my personal point of view if it shows some artistic skill then its art although I must admit that it would be nice to see a little more imagination and creativity.It was a great little journey with some fascinating imagery, lots of geometrical shapes that occur when you have the linear canals placed against an urban geometric landscape. I was also struck by the sharp contrasts of the environment, decay sits with modernity, sleek buildings wedged between older structures, regeneration alongside decay and the traces of human presence sit alongside the natural environment that is slowly reclaiming the land.I must admit that I was fascinated by the tunnels, they take me back to my childhood when I used to wonder what it would be like to go in train tunnels, obviously I was too sensible to risk my life looking in so it was with a childhood fascination that I passed through the canal tunnels.I have a fair bit of imagery so I can start making some drawings so expect them to be posted soon. I’ve uploaded some images from today