A Loose Traverse

I visited this exhibition in November at the Greenwich Gallery and it was fascinating!  I would love to take part in something like this! 

Detail of Project

A Loose Traverse is an exhibition created by The Crossing Lines Group.  Twenty-six photographers spent over three weeks traversing London this summer with knowledge only of the route taken by the last walker.  No other information was provided and each walker was free to choose their own follow-on direction and walk for as long as they could still move. One photographer, one day, each day.

I remember from Art classes just how interesting it is when you give a group of people a theme to work with and each one interprets it differently!

The Routes

And I found looking round, that different people focused on different themes in their route; some looked at buildings, architecture, others picked out graphic qualities, some montages were completely abstract, others were about people and so on.  It was fascinating - I found myself wondering what I would have done - would I have picked out graphic themes or intricate details?  Would I have aimed a "street" collection of characters or tried some unusual perspectives on urban landscapes?

Route 7 Gill Golding

Route 12 Ingrid Newton

Another reason for my interest in the exhibition is of course the participation of a
friend of mine, Gill Golding.  Gill had route number 7 on the map.  Her interpretation of the route was about the shapes of structures and also shapes of spaces.  


Route 12 by Ingrid Newton was the next one that caught my eye.  In this collection, I was very drawn to the strong collection of graphic images and shapes, strong colours, and an almost abstract representation of the area.  You cannot tell from the images where they were taken; Newton has seen want most people would probably walk past without noticing.

Route 16 Scott Davies

Route 19 Denis Galvin

Still on the graphic theme, I enjoyed looking at this sequence of monochrome images along Route 16 by Scott Davies; again identification of the area from these is not obvious! The use of monochrome really makes the graphic lines stand out.

The final highlight for me was, Route 19 by Denis Galvin in contrast, was bright and full of detail, with lots more information about the context and environment, and a celebration of colour.