Crematorium:

I initially set out to document the mechanical process of cremation but found my own mantra for the project in the 'The Devil's in the details'. That is, little elements of the process became fascinating and I found even the most mundane of objects in such an environment became charged with significance and symbolism. Metaphors of death, symbolic suggestion of religious belief, suggestion of an after-life, even the evidence of life itself, in the most mundane items and even in the construction of the crematorium itself.

The more obvious imagery can be found in the photographs of the actual burning of the body. These were achieved through the viewing aperture which is a small window of very thick glass. The intense temperatures inside the chamber and the glass itself created a slight distortion, this coupled with the speed and unpredictability of the flame movement and no way of knowing how the body will 'sit' as the coffin burns away, made it a challenging but extremely fascinating process with which to work.

The almost clinical, grey surround of the crematorium and the drama of the reds and intensity of the blacks in the cremation itself, create, for me, a fascinating and contradictory visual landscape.

One central aim of this project was to show the unseen 'journey' that many of us take but obviously never experience and through that journey to confront the viewer with the processes of death and our own mortality.

Ultimately I have found through the care and attention to every detail taken in the cremation process, a sense of the dignity ascribed to the dead and through that a sense of our own humanity.