Greenock/Gourock
I've just finished a new photo zine, called Greenock/Gourock. It contains 30 images, 15 from each of the two locations in the title, in juxtaposed pairs. Here's the introductory text, and a few image pairs:
I live in Gourock; I go shopping in Greenock. I walk around Gourock; I travel to Greenock by bus. Thiszine is about the differences and similarities between the two places.Gourock (current population 10,000) was originally a fishing village, then a seaside resort, and isnow a suburban residential area. It has a few shops, but no real economy. Rather, people travel from thereto work, mainly by car. Some no doubt have jobs in Greenock, but others commute to Glasgow, which isabout an hour away on the motorway. I rent a room here, but the area where I live is mostly a zone ofowner-occupation, with detached or semi-detached houses set back from the street by gardens. However,Gourock also has several areas of public housing, which are more densely inhabited and have moregeneric architecture.
Greenock (current population 41,000) is a larger regional centre, with local government buildings forInverclyde Council, a shopping mall, chain supermarkets, etc. But it is itself a satellite of Glasgow, and itsnineteenth-century prosperity depended on that proximity: that is, it is closer to the mouth of the ClydeEstuary than Glasgow, so it was easier and cheaper for some ships to unload sugar, tobacco and cottonthere rather than continue on to the larger city. The town was also a centre for shipbuilding and relatedindustries. Greenock still has greater visible extremes of wealth disparity than Gourock, with largercouncil estates, including tower blocks, but also very grand individual houses, most of which seem to dateback to the town's heyday. Like many Atlantic ports and old industrial centres, Greenock's fortunes havefallen, but it retains a busy freight-container terminal – and during the summer cruise ships use the townas a base for day trips.
Suburbia is a place where dogs bark at solitary walkers. Being without a car and being alone are bothinherently suspicious states of being – taking photographs is even worse. If I could completely effacemyself, I would. I live a marginal existence, and I wanted these photos to express that: to depict not aninvasion of privacy, but a reluctance to trespass. A sense of distance and withdrawal – of tactfulness.
No comments have been added yet.
