Gary Colclough

(b 1977, United Kingdom. Lives and works in London)

“My recent collages explore combinations of images of wild and cultivated landscapes. I have been working with bookplates from nature and travel from books of the English and European landscape that encourage us to appreciate and value the landscape; but are also part of a tradition of commodifying it. The books often present the landscape in picturesque terms emphasising its beauty and presenting it as something that exists for us to consume; either vicariously or in person as tourists and site-seers. “Working with collage and the processes of cutting; reshaping and constructing new images of the landscape I'm reminded of the area I grew up around in the South West of England. A subtly industrial landscape; although green and bucolic; it has been shaped by hundreds of years of farming; grazing and cultivation. My collages are an attempt to weave together thoughts and ideas about the landscape as a construction and to think about the images I work with as a collection of ideas; histories and perspectives as much as places”.