Mail Shots 8

Both Images: Stokes Croft, Bristol, April 2019

Mail slots have been pretty thin on the ground on here, of late - but there was no way I could leave these two little gems uncommemorated.

Mail Shots 7

Sneinton, Nottingham, January 2017

It's time for the mail-slot slot again.  These never really go anywhere, other than to top-up my prevailing love of formal geometry  and Modernist frontally.  Nevertheless, they're always there, in the background of nearly every urban photoshoot I conduct - and so my collection slowly grows.  These were captured over recent  months - mostly in Nottingham, (supplemented by one from my own Leicester back yard).

Central Nottingham, September 2016

They form a kind of, largely unexploited, notional sub-theme, at this stage.  Doubtless, one could construct a thesis around their symbolism as conduits of faltering, analogue communication, or as organs of admittance.  Somewhat simplistically, it's difficult not to read them as oral simulacra.  I'm also aware of an implied dialogue between notions of impassive closure and gaping vacuity.  That, in turn, seems to trigger a slew of related fantasies about the status of whatever spaces lie beyond.  Either way, I'm equally attracted to the smartly-painted-green-chequer-plate, and the rotted-plank-and-wire-basket iterations.  

Former Cattle Market Site, Nottingham, April 2017

The pretension and allusive prolixity of all this is deliberate and unashamed.  It is, however, equally valid to suggest that these images represent little more than some periodic recourse to a visual comfort zone.

West Leicester, April 2017

It also occurs to me that, in time, they might also come to form a surprisingly comprehensive catalogue of physical urban texture, revealed via the medium of building materials, and construction techniques.

Former Cattle Market Site, Nottingham, April 2017

Mail Shots 6

All Images: Digbeth, Birmingham 2016

I never seem to get bored of these.

I hope you don't either.

Mail Shots 5

Central Leicester, February 2016

Time for a few more of these, I think.  They've been collecting in my Pictures folder for a while.  Just to keep you, you know... posted.

West Leicester, March 2016

North Leicester, November 2015

North Leicester, March 2016

North Leicester, March 2016

North Leicester, March 2016

North Leicester, March 2016

Mail Shots 4

Being the latest instalment in an ongoing series and the first examples of 2016.  I particularly love the set of mostly blanked off slots.  I now realise how they seem to fit with my current concern with silenced voices, closed avenues of communication, etc.

Central Leicester, January 2016

Central Leicester, January 2016

I'm loving the crappy, ad-hoc labelling on this one too...

Hockley, Nottingham, August 2015

Mail Shots 3

It's a while since I put any of these up, but they're all still out there, and I keep finding them.

Digbeth, Birmingham, May 2015

These four seem to form a meditation on neutral colour, and, in a couple of cases, on the idea of being there and not there.  The reality is that all of these examples are details of buildings or businesses that were, (at the time of their being observed), either vacant or defunct.  I suppose there is also an definite sense of their representing a form of physical communication that is itself becoming obsolete.

Nottingham, May 2014

Certain ideas about redundancy, cancellation, vacancy or extinction seem to preoccupy me (again) at the moment, but I'll let you make your own mind up about any specific associations these motifs may, or may not, evoke.

Nottingham, October 2015

One thing is certain, mail box slots constitute a conduit of communication, - an organ of admission into a building or a concern.  There is an distinct poignancy about their stopping-up.

Leicester, October 2015