This October, I had the privilege to take part in Artbound’s Ideal Destinations exhibition at Hebden Bridge Town Hall, a community-owned space, with a welcoming café that allows you to drink deliciously simple filter coffee at an unbranded price.

It was the first time I was exhibiting digital, coulour pictures, which led to a succession of new questions: how to print, how to frame, how to display. Luckily, a few months previously, I had met in a photographer whose work had been printed on mat paper and hung, unframed, using paper clips. I very much liked the idea as it made the image look like a drying canvas. 

The pictures I was showing had been taken during a sea kayaking journey to Northern Norway, and I wanted to retain the idea of movement by presenting the work unframed, as if the images had just been imprinted on the paper and were drying on the fly. In additition, I very much liked the immediacy of contact with the pictures it afforded: no glass, no barrier between the viewer and the landscape. Meg from Artbound understood my idea and did a fantastic job of setting the pictures up.

I had been to Hebden Bridge previously, attending evenings run by the friendly and welcoming Shaggy Dogs Storytellers. This time, I had the opportunity to explore more, stayed in the well-run hostel, and walked through woodlands up to Hardcastle Cragg and its off-grid café, a real treat with the forest in full autumnal bloom. Seeing the wealth of community projects and care for the environment happening in and around town certainly was a welcome antidote to the news!

I am currently exhibiting black & white pictures of last winter’s late snow in Yorkshire as part of Artbound’s Winter Wonderland exhibition and have happily joined the community.