• Do not go gentle into that good night,
• Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
• Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
•  
•                             Dylan Thomas

With the addition of a photographic record of decay, the four books of images of paintings and photographs of the sea defences at the Cuckmere and Splash Point are complete. I echo the drawings of Eric Slater in taking visual pleasure of this stretch of the Sussex chalk cliffs. Like Slater I live in Seaford, not far from his house, and walk much of the ground Slater walked between here and Cuckmere Haven. An estimated 350,000 global tourists are reckoned to do the walk every year. Whilst Slater captured in his woodcuts the scenes along his route I have focused on the decay of the sea defences that still enable us to follow in his footsteps.

Slater’s House about 800metres from mine

The view Slater would have had

Seaford’s Pier at Splash Point did not exist when Slater did his walks. He would have been familiar with it as he lived in Seaford until his death in 1963. Built in the early 1950’s, the ‘pier’ covers a sewer outfall now gaining some national notoriety for the failures of the water boards to keep pace with the population growth. Other features that Slater would have been familiar with, such as the Coastguard Station at the Cuckmere have been taken by the sea, and a favourite destination of his on his walk, the Coastguard Cottages are being allowed by those charged with safeguarding our heritage to follow beneath the waves.

the defences applied by the Environment Agency are as useful as a chocolate teapot

For the last few years I have walked and written, photographed and lately painted my own more microscopic look at Slaters landscape, and zoomed in on the decay of the defences set up to protect it. I have produced over 100 artworks exploring the decay. There is colour and texture in the corroding metal and concrete encrusted with lichens and weed which I have responded to both with the camera and paint.

Bolt 3 – corroded bolt securing metal protective sheets (private collection)

Many historians believe every Empire in its final years has a burst of 50- 60 years of creative output, like the last flare of a dying match before darkness covers all. I like to think I am a small piece of that light of British culture and will not go gentle into that night, although my old age means inevitably I will do soon. These 4 books carry a mix of photographic prints and giclée reproductions of the paintings related.

BRotS#50 ‘Sea Through‘.(private collection)

All images are printed with museum quality inks and on St Thomas’s Mill archival paper. All are beautifully bound for me by a local craft bookbinder. All prints are made by me on my own high-quality printer, and each page is signed and titled. There are 20 pages in each book, with individual prints sold by the New Art Gallery in Eastbourne. Whilst the paintings are A1 (and many are still available through my gallery) the giclée’s are bound in 20 page volumes sized at 490mm x 340mm, the pages A3+.

The four volumes are titled:

‘Trust in Rust’ (one copy in the Towner Gallery collection, Eastbourne)

‘Fisherman’s Tackle’

‘Seaford’s Pier’

and ‘Splash Point’, this last being just giclée prints of photographs showing the decay and now in the Seaford Museum collection

Copies are available, produced to order, and copies may be viewed by arrangement. Each volume is priced at £600, a full set available for £2,100

Needless to say all images are my copyright, and the process of creation (there are canvases too) is explained through a series of articles on my website, including

Chocolate Teapot – PatrickGoff.com

Doorway into Dreams – PatrickGoff.com

Marine Growth – PatrickGoff.com

Fisherman’s Tackle – PatrickGoff.com

March March – PatrickGoff.com

A Renaissance – PatrickGoff.com

Diamonds in the Rough – PatrickGoff.com

And there are more…

Follow me on ‘X’ to see where these journey ends or on Facebook or of course through my website and this blog