Notes
These are a collection of images that I made during the years that I lived in a house-share on Russell Road, Birmingham. My bedroom’s window faced the entrance of Cannon Hill Park. With great gusto, I might even have been able to jump into the park from my window, if it were not for the birch tree separating us. My first memory of the park was when I went, after work, to look around the house-share and parked in the adjacent car park which slopes up, with the top looking out into the park. I met the housemates and was feeling pretty good about the place, when one of the housemates asked where I was parked. With the light fading, those familiar with Cannon Hill car park will empathise with the panic that came next. The car park closes at dusk, as the sign outside the car park informs you. My housemates would look back on this evening with great amusement, claiming they had never seen someone run across a road and into a car so fast. I moved into the house in February 2018 on a snowy Saturday. That first day, after waving goodbye to my previous landlord (also known as my Mum), I took my camera and went across the road and into the snowy park. Before cresting the top of the car park I had no idea of the scale of Cannon Hill park, and thanks to the snow, I didn’t have much idea when I did. I chose a direction and started exploring. That first afternoon set the tone for my time in Cannon Hill park. I explored every nook and cranny of the park. It’s an unsubstantiated claim, but I suspect that during the years that I lived across from it, I spent more time in Cannon Hill park than anyone else. I took photographs, exercised (sometimes the Park Run), ate, read, relaxed. On sunny weekend mornings, I would make a coffee and walk across the road to drink it. I wondered if, one day, I would get one of those benches with my name on it. If I do, hopefully it doesn’t become the favourite bench of a portly topless gentleman (I wonder, does he still sit there?). I’ve even fought the gangster geese that parole the south-east side of the lake. I’ve no idea what is in the grass at the park, but it sure gave those geese a lot of spunk.
A factor that has heavily influenced my photography through the years is comfort. Even if people aren’t outwardly making gestures of judgement, I worry that they do so inwardly. This worry restricts me and the photographs that I feel comfortable making. Whilst taking photographs of people in the park, I only had the courage to do so whilst pretending not to be. The photographs in this collection that were taken in public, in the park, contrast with those that were taken in private, in my bedroom across the road. Unselfconscious, in my room, I played with light.