Hold the line
2016
7:15 mins [Extract 2 mins]
A poetic, multi-screen exploration of the relationship between nature and our built environment.
Shot on the Isle of Sheppey in the mouth of the Thames Estuary, UK, Hold the line, considers the accelerated erosion process happening in this location to draw attention to notions of time, permanence, power and control between the landscape and those that attempt to own and occupy it. While our gaze is fixed on the horizon, the sea - almost hidden in it’s massiveness - expands relentlessly, timeless and careless of personal and political boundaries. A defensive military structure that once stood on the cliff-top only one hundred years ago now lies in the sea, the ocean having erased the ground beneath it. Stripped of purpose, the structure becomes only form and material, a disruption to the horizon line, a surface for seaweed and barnacles to grow, brick to be ground into sand.
Made during a time dominated by the Brexit debate and against a backdrop of the increasingly urgent climate crisis, Hold the Line considers how domestic obsessions can blind us to the bigger issues that will ultimately catch up with us.