Profile
Frank Watson was a Senior Lecturer in Photography at Westminster University teaching on both BA and MA Courses in theory and practice. He is currently presenting a radio show on Resonance Radio (104.4FM) entitled The Sound of Photography.
thesoundofphotoography.com.
His photographic practice considers the spatial relationship between landscape and architecture. In 2004 he published a book of photographs on abandoned Cold War Sites in England entitled The Hush House with an essay by Cathy Slessor.
He has researched the relationship between sound and photography and these ideas appear as a chapter in a book entitled A Fearsome Heritage: Diverse Legacies of the Cold War, published in 2007 and in 2009 he released a DVD with the sound artist Dave Lawrence entitled Isles of Grain available from Artdata.
He has also made work in conjunction with the architects Chance de Silva. He has exhibited work widely including the Design Museum and the Museum of London. He has curated exhibitions including Living in This Mess (2002) at the Morley Gallery, London. In 2006 he participated in the Faster Than Sound event as part of The Aldeburgh Music Festival. In 2008 he curated and exhibited in an exhibition entitled Soundings from the Estuary as part of the London Festival of Architecture.
In 2010 he had a solo exhibition at the London West Gallery as well as exhibiting at the Royal Academy Summer exhibition. The Soundings project featured in a chapter in the book Emerging Landscapes: Between Production and Representation (Ashgate, 2014.) edited by Eugenie Shinkle and Davide Deriu.
In 2014 he published Soundings from the Estuary accompanied with an essay by Jonathan Meades. He had a one man show The Back of Beyond as part of the London Photo Festival in 2016.
His latest book entitled ‘Rollercoasting’ was published in 2022.The work considers the Kent coast as a frontier between England and Europe as well as the idiosyncratic relationship that is visually apparent when viewing this erratic and often iconic landscape. The Kent coastline fluctuates between the flatlands of Thanet and Dungeness and the undulating chalk hills and cliffs of the North Downs.
The photographs convey the ambivalence that is apparent where certain sites, often military in nature are historically memorialized whilst other places remain quiet, unremarkable and overlooked. The images attempt to portray a coastline that is shaped by both respect and contempt, where the natural and the industrial are often at odds with one another.
SE1etc. During lockdown I spent the time exploring on foot most of the labyrinthine streets of London SE1 between Waterloo, Vauxhall and Tower Bridge. The area is a rich mix of industrial buildings that were once part of The London Docks, large council estates often hidden in the backstreets and more recently architectural developments including the makeovers of old warehouses. The deserted streets added to the atmosphere of the idiosyncratic nature of the area.
Circling Saturn: A Sebaldian Drift is a loose set of images that probably has its origins from reading Rings of Saturn, W.G. Sebald’s account of roaming across E. Anglian counties. Illustrating his work would be a an absurd endeavour. So instead these photographs reflect my own pre-occupations with the area, predominantly the environmental threat to the coastline.
Cul de Sac: is a reflection upon how the architecture of the suburbs of South London (where Watson grew up) was often intended to blend in with the countryside; (think Garden Suburb). Unlike the photographs in the other projects these images have been doctored to reveal the idealised way home ownership can also be seen as confinement and incarceration.