1. Why did you choose these particular dilapidated buildings in and around Cyprus?

My interest in abandoned architecture began prior to going to Cyprus when I took photos of empty mill and factory buildings for my degree work. Moving to Limassol and finding myself among so many derelict buildings - many almost literally on my doorstep - this project became a natural progression for my work. These new buildings differed to those back home however, firstly in the sense that they were far more accessible allowing me to explore them in far greater detail. This meant that I would return to those buildings which most captured my interest time and again. These became the buildings featured in the final selection of images. This interest was really based on a certain quality that each building held that spoke to me about the themes I had in mind, memory and the passage of time being key amongst these. So in ‘El Palaiologinas, Limassol' for instance I became fascinated by the faded posters that remained untouched outside of this abandoned nightclub and the strange texture of the peeling walls. In the selected image of this building these features are half seen in the shadows.

The second difference, of course, is that these are not industrial buildings but residential or social spaces. This alters the way in which an audience is going to engage with these images, hopefully allowing them to relate more strongly with the spaces that they see.

2. Your Photography has a definition of light which evokes strong contrasts. Is light source pre determined and planned ahead?

The contrast is to a large extent the consequence of the light conditions in Cyprus at the time that these photographs were taken, as such it was an aspect of the work which developed with the project. It is an aspect however that I have sought to utilise, even heighten through draining much of the colour and leaving almost nothing but shades of light and dark. Of course there is a definite thematic contrast in these images to which this refers visually; that of the shadowy, closed-off nature of the buildings and the bright seaside city in which they were found.

This opposition between light and shadow also serves as an ideal metaphor referring to many of the oppositions with which the work deals: presence and absence, occupation and abandonment, past and present etc.

3. Your Photography does have abstraction throughout, I would like to ask about the shadows in 'El Palaiologinas, Limassol'. The long shadow questions the viewer to think what caused that shadow? Is pre - determined viewer awareness something you have been working towards?

Not necessarily but there is a definite attempt to direct the viewer’s attention toward what they may ordinarily overlook. As a photographer, as opposed to a painter or sculptor for instance, I feel my role is not to add to the visual world but to select and present aspects already in existence. It is true however that the way in which I present these images - the manipulation of the colour, emphasising of shadow, choice of angle - is done to emphasise certain aspects of the image and direct the viewer into thinking about the themes that this may raise.

The shadows in this particular image again developed naturally and are not deliberately placed but would certainly have contributed to the decision to select this image as a part of the final group.

4. There is a recurring use of doors in this body of work, suggesting a way out. Was that intentional?

Not a way out as such but a link between the two ‘worlds’ which these images suggest. As I have said before these spaces seem cut off from the other inhabited spaces around them, hidden or forgotten. Again, like the light, this has a both a literal and metaphorical interpretation.

Metaphorically it returns to the idea of memory. Memory was a theme that I thought about frequently with this project and, as a bridge between the past and the present, these doors are intended to suggest such a connection.

5. Some of the doors are very well hidden, perhaps this suggests the notion of metaphors for hardship in life? How do you feel towards them?

Bearing in mind my answer to question four, this is intended to suggest the disconnect between these spaces and the world around them. Although they are accessible, they’re not easily so, the doors may be sealed or else obstructed even overgrown. This continues to feed into the allusion to past and present and their connection through memory, as the two may not always be easily linked and memory can fade or else be incomplete.

Thank you Tim Watson for participating in this constructive analysis.