I have been otherwise distracted of late what with work then the Christmas/New Year break complete with inappropriate large format weather systems, so it was a relief to gather 20 latent images back from the lab this week.

I had forgotten how long ago November was but I was delighted to get these two images from my new series ‘Backsides of resorts’

These were made on large format Kodak Portra 400 5×4 film. I have made some images digitally as the weather windows were few and far between for this type of work. Ever since I saw Martin Parr’s ‘Bad Weather’ image I realised that most images I have seen and indeed made at Southwold have been typical grockle images, and let’s face it Southwold fills up with grockles most weeks of the year.

The funny thing is I don’t ever see myself as a grockle when we rent a place there and I suppose I have seen enough of Gun Hill, the Pier and Beach Huts so I find myself trudging around the footpaths and dykes looking for alternate views of this quintessentially British seaside resort to find out how it works.

Most people who work in Southwold cannot afford to live there and the allotment gardens are just down the lane from a skanky 1960s- 1970’s style police station and down from there is the sewage treatment plant and a scrap heap. Everywhere we humans put down roots(sic) there will be gardens, waste and a need for law and order. There certainly seemed to be a law and order to these gardens but as always in these places there is a Union flag flying somewhere and there was certainly ‘Weather’ on the way in the day I made this one.