Say Goodbye to the Larches
I began the Say Goodbye to the Larches project in 2021, when I noticed larches being felled in the Lake District. I spend a lot of time photographing woodland, and I was already aware of how ash trees were struggling with dieback, and how Phytophthora Ramorum was spreading through the larch. Larch is a non-native species, and mostly a plantation tree in the UK, so conservationists are not too concerned about losing the tree itself, but its large numbers mean that the felling will leave the landscape radically changed. And what the loss of the larch and the ash represent is a more widespread loss, from the destruction of habitat through pollution, overdevelopment, and woodland clearance, to the spread of disease through the global plant trade, and our warming climate. "Ramorum" as it is known, has the potential to put other species of tree at risk, so the felling of the larch is necessary, but it is also a warning sign of things to come. I have augmented these cyanotype prints with orange paint to represent the paint trees are marked with before felling, and the sap of the larch, which carries the disease.
Five of these pieces (Cyanotype prints with orange paint, on A3 and 30x30cm handmade cotton rag paper by Khadi) are part of the group On the Brink exhibition at the Dot-Art gallery in Liverpool (Friday 28th January – Saturday 19th March, 2022), and at Open Eye Gallery as part of their Look Climate Lab 2022 exhibition, also in Liverpool.
