Subtle Distances as a part of 'Depth', explores the complex emotions that arise when being in unfamiliar places, capturing the tension between detachment and fascination when encountering new cultures. Documented during a car camping trip across Europe, it became a way of refecting on the experience of becoming a full time observer, watching the lives and customs of others unfold from a distance, while slowly finding comfort in that disconnection. The work considers how unfamiliarity can become soothing, even grounding, when we allow ourselves to sit within it. My take on 'Depth' is a quiet meditation on movement, observation, and the gentle transformation that occurs when we navigate new and unknown spaces. Accepting difference, embracing uncertainty, and finding beauty in the spaces between-those moments of warm liminality where disconnection becomes it's own form of connection. 

As a group 'Depth' considers the experience of travelling, seeing our surroundings more vividly as an outsider and analysing how things work in other countries differently to our own.

Sarah's jewellery celebrates the lush, wild eco-systems in Scandanavia where she camped last summer: the experience was out of time with deep, dark forests flourishing in their wildness, balanced eco-systems that worked.

Alfie's paintings appreciate the connectedness of strangers in European countries, and how communities appreciate being together in a way that is often missing in the UK.

La Passagiate, Alfie Barker, oil on canvas