Spirited Away (Part 1) - Fan art by Julia Tveritina
A Country Kind of Silence continues my internal exploration of feelings surrounding my sense of identity. A sense that belonging isn’t as unattainable as it is hard to grasp. England has been my adoptive home for some time now, 26 years to be exact.
However, moving from where my heart is rooted has had a profound effect on me. Feelings of unease and uncertainty have always been with me and many of these are tied to the constant changes I see in my surroundings; these developments have often mirrored a change in myself as time’s gone by.
I wanted A Country Kind of Silence to be a response to this change – of perception and my personal sense of self. The urban landscape is borne entirely from our creation and it tells us so much.
We plan and build, reap and destroy and repeat the process as we pass through. It’s easy to forget that many of these things still bear the influence of the past - telling us much about ourselves while stuck in time, surviving, struggling and sometimes just about existing.
book - the series is being published by the excellent Setanta Books, and is available to pre-order now… highly recommended!
All images & text © Ian Howorth
