Artist Statement
A ROAD NOT TRAVELLED IS STILL A ROAD (2022)
Having lived overseas for a decade, I moved back to the UK at the end of 2019 to a village in the North-East of England. The place where my husband grew up. In anticipation of the move, I imagined I would drive up to my hometown of Edinburgh quite frequently to visit family and friends and reacquaint myself with my favourite city. But this was not to be. During the Covid lockdowns and restrictions, I became acutely aware of the divide between Scotland and England, with government advice and rules often not aligned. The Anglo-Scottish border had sliced through the country, causing an impenetrable disconnect at critical moments for my family. I found it particularly frustrating to be so close to ‘home’ yet unable to jump in my car and go. Like most people, my interactions and connections transformed into digital representations and experiences. Society’s reliance on technology was apparent. For many, myself included, it was both a blessing and a curse.
The Anglo-Scottish border is, in many ways, an arbitrary construct; it is not real, there is no physicality. No fence, wall or demarcation is etched onto the land’s surface. Instead, it is ninety-six miles worth of delineation, almost entirely invisible. We have been told it exists, so we accept that it does. Yet how many people know where it lies or the path it takes from coast to coast? Not many, I suspect. Fast-forward to post-pandemia, notably the freedom to travel, and I was interested in finding out how many roads cross the border. I imagine these roads to be much like sutures – holding each side in place while taking the strain from Scotland’s independent streak. I took to the website What3Words to find the border’s exact location, in its entirety, and identify every road it intersects. I copied and pasted every set of three words along the border’s delineation, denoting every three square metre section of land, giving it a tangible presence and sense of reality.
I find it fascinating that the landscape on either side of the border is the same – absolutely nothing changes as you pass across that imaginary line. Nor does it change the further you travel. The land is identical. Without any external context, knowing which country you
are in is impossible. Despite this, or perhaps because of this, our national identities are strong. The border signifies a more relevant change in culture and identity than it does of the actual land it divides.
In homage to the seminal works on the open road by Walker Evans and Robert Frank and inspired by the topographical methodology of
Dr Kate Mellor’s Island series, I aimed to create a contemporary body of work born from the road-trip genus yet firmly rooted in the contemporary realm of the digital. This is a series that speaks of the border’s dual ability; to unite and yet separate. Around the world, borders are synonymous with tension, rivalry, and war. They provide methods of escape, but they can also confine.