Landscapes of Innocence and Experience by Simon Roberts

During my extended journey across England for the making of We English, the bank Northern Rock collapsed and the credit crunch unfolded, events that heralded the beginning in a shift in public consciousness about the impending financial crisis. Twenty months later whilst making work for The Election Project, I returned to many of the places I had visited and this time, the landscapes were alive not with people at leisure, but with canvassing candidates, political slogans, and echoing with warnings of cutbacks and imminent hardship. Landscapes of Innocence and Experience explores the changes that have affected Britain economically and politically over the last three years. This series of landscape photographs, taken between 2007 and 2011, mine the country’s overlooked moments and are shot through with unmistakable fissures and visual oddities that hint at the economic unravelling, along with elements of the public reaction and anger of what’s to come. In contrast to We English and The Election Project, this series explore more esoteric themes such as the collective psychological effect of this new era of austerity.

Simon Roberts is a Brighton, England, based artist.
To see more of Simon's work, please visit his website