Thalia. Garden Construct Series #156 Photograph - Limited Edition of 5

Born into a farming family in County Durham in the northeast of England, I grew up in the working rural spaces of that landscape. Early in life, I formed a deep connection to the outdoors that ultimately sparked my love of botanical and landscape photography. It also allowed me to see first-hand the level of human influence required to create and maintain the many changing elements of the landscape – and that our perception of what is ‘natural’ is flawed. Recognising our often unnoticed intersection with nature has become central to my subject choices as a photographer. While recording the nuanced shapes, colourways, formations and interactions of flora is my way of understanding and exploring landscapes, nothing I photograph is truly ‘natural’ in the purest sense of the word. Every subject is the result of human intervention altering, constricting or dilating nature's path for our own benefit. In a world where plants are now part of mass manufacturing processes, I deliberately portray botanical life at a more individualistic, but no less curated level. This throws focus onto subjects that can be perceived as being directly of nature or natural, but the very existence of which relies entirely on human need, imposition or desire. By exposing these dimensions of our relationship to the natural world, I hope to enable us to engage more richly and in new ways with subjects that we thought we knew so well.