JULY 2024 · WITNESS
NOWHERE. BLOCK9 GLASTONBURY FESTIVAL 2024
Block 9, Worthy Farm, Somerset
The Genosys heads are concrete and large-scale brutalist — monumental sculptural heads rising above the arena floor, the suspension cables and industrial frame behind them part of the structure's vocabulary. They anchor what is otherwise pure motion. Everything else at NOWHERE moves or is designed to look as if it does.
I shot at slow shutter speeds throughout. The crowd becomes raised arms and silhouettes, blurred into gesture. A single festival-goer dissolves into motion, face and shoulders abstracted by movement. Coloured light sweeps across the frame — red, pink, blue and gold — the source invisible, the trail remaining. A face lit by overhead light, features softened into scan lines. The method was intentional: the intensity of the place doesn't sit still in a sharp image.
The method was intentional: the intensity of the place doesn't sit still in a sharp image.
Block 9, Glastonbury Festival — July 2024
The carousel horses are frozen briefly in frame. One shot of the teeth and blank expression of a carousel horse head — the fairground sinister under the black overcast sky. Another of the same ride in motion, white and dark stripes rotating into blur.
The NOWHERE sign itself appears twice. Once: white illuminated text against a blurred background, documentary, legible. Once: the sign with teal, red and yellow neon sources behind it, the light gathering in the letters. The skull artwork built from white typography on dark background is behind glass in one of the installation panels — a text-based death's head staring out from the middle of the arena.
A golden angular sculpture, large-scale, catches the motion blur treatment in one frame. The concrete structures in daylight before dark show the scale of the site. By 1am, the structures are context for everything that happens in front of them.
The last image I made was the billboard with silhouetted figures moving across it, the motion blur catching the crowd mid-flow.
Crowd with raised arms blurred in energetic motion, silhouettes against bright light
Motion-blurred face and shoulders of festival-goer, abstract movement
Tall concrete structure with small figure and motion blur below overcast sky
Skull artwork constructed from white text and typography on dark background
Ferris wheel or carousel ride blurred in motion with white and dark stripes
Carousel horse head detail with teeth, fairground ride decoration in black and white
Blurred human figure in motion, abstracted silhouette with streaking light
Blurred face in motion with harsh overhead lighting and scan lines effect
Sweeping colored light streaks across image, red, pink, blue and gold motion blur
Black and white Block9 installation artwork with figures and white heart motif
NOWHERE text sign illuminated in white against blurred background, Block9 venue marker
NOWHERE sign with vibrant colored light sources, teal, red and yellow neon glow
Golden angular sculpture with motion blur, large-scale festival art installation
Motion blur across billboard with silhouetted figures, dynamic movement capture
Large concrete monumental head sculpture, brutalist Genosys arena architecture
Concrete sculptural head detail against overcast sky, monumental festival structure
Dark brutalist concrete structure with industrial frame and suspension cables, stage set
Carousel horse with motion blur and light streaks, fairground ride in movement