Flight Print

The River Lea, or Lee, was once London's main water supply and its valley the home of extensive agriculture, most of it under glass. It was an important freight route with the Lea Navigation canal and offered a easy route for narrowboats and later the railways, then roads. Its length is broken up and criss-crossed with bridges, viaducts, locks and weirs but forms now the Lea Valley Park. Despite it picturesque quality it is a post-industrial landscape, much of it from the Victorian period with hefty ironworks, railings, columns and rusting iron panels. These are the inspiration behind these pieces. This piece suggests the mechanisation of the river, the flights of locks, the embankment of the navigation canal, the weighty imposition of brick and iron to cross the water.