The Beautiful Game

“When I was a child, I used to take the train from Aylesbury, a small commuter town in England, to London, where my father lived. A little over halfway, just past Harrow-on-the-Hill, I was able to spy the twin towers of Wembley Stadium, as they fleetingly formed part of the skyline. My passion for football feels as much a part of my DNA as any physical characteristic and the thrill this sight gave me was inextricably linked with the anticipation of seeing my father –journey and destination blurred. As a photographer, my life has, at times, felt fairly nomadic; London, Sydney, New York… Work has meant that I travel far and wide and often, and, when I do, I am always that boy on the train. These photographs are the bookmarks of my life; the folded down corners that take me back to an exact time and place. An unplanned sortie after a commissioned shoot; time spent waiting in England’s green commuter belt for my fiancée to land at Stanstead; a trip out with my son; a rare afternoon with my brother on the north Kent coast. They are football grounds, yes, but they are forever tied in with these moments, public spaces with intensely personal attachments. Of course, the grounds themselves are also destinations. For thousands, they are places of passion, full of history, full of stories. Viewed here, however, with nothing but echoes of the full-throated support that fills them for a fraction of their life, they are rendered as they are most often – markers in life's landscape, passing points of interest, both destination and journey.”