A Certain Movement is concerned with intricate natural processes occurring all around us. The movements of animals follow rhythms and patterns - seasonal migration, reproduction, nesting, feeding; these cyclical processes have a significance which can be read like wordless texts. If we are patient enough to observe such movements, and the signs by which they can be inferred, we gain access to a private sphere where the act of looking becomes an intimate one. The quiet events we then witness are adaptations evolved to fill an ecological niche, and like that carved for a statue, a species fits within theirs. They are nestled in the world - the word niche derives from the french nicher, which means ‘to make a nest’ - their lives shape their environments and are shaped by them.
Behaviours develop over time, with each generation passing traits to the next. So when we watch animals, we are looking at an accumulation of past movements; like the browse-line on a tree, or a nest site that has been occupied repeatedly for centuries, its present form slowly determined over time by repeated actions.
The earliest works from the series were commissioned for the Jerwood Photoworks Awards.