Time does not halt; it shifts, erodes, and transforms. What is left behind is not forgotten, nor is it truly lifeless. Across landscapes shaped by human presence, structures crumble and walls fracture, yet within them something endures. Vines creep, roots entwine, and memory settles into dust and stone. This is not a story of endings, but one of persistence.
Abandoned, Not Dead forms the published outcome of this wider exploration, focusing specifically on sites across Cornwall. While the broader project documents abandonment as a national experience, the book draws attention to the Cornish landscape, where sea, weather, and time actively reshape what remains. Here, absence becomes a presence, and decay becomes a record of lived histories rather than loss alone.
Nothing is ever truly lost. What crumbles is gathered, what fades is remembered, and what is abandoned finds new purpose. Time wears down walls, the sea claims structures, and nature intervenes, not to erase, but to transform.
In the quiet of decay, there is movement. In forgotten places, there is renewal. The past does not disappear; it lingers in the roots gripping stone, in the salt carried on the wind, and in the resilience of what remains.
These places are not dead.
They are simply becoming something new.
Through Lenses of Remembrance: Ethical Photography at Dark Tourism Sites
This body of work examines ethical approaches to photographing dark tourism sites, asking how photography can serve as a respectful act of remembrance rather than consumption. Through reflection and visual inquiry, the project explores the responsibility of the photographer when documenting spaces marked by tragedy.
A visit to Oradour-sur-Glane in France forms a central point of reflection, grounding the work in lived experience and reinforcing the importance of sensitivity, care, and intention when photographing sites of historical trauma.
