WHERE WILL THE SOULS OF THE DEAD LIVE NOW? Angel Meadow is a crucible land. Once bucolic, it became home to a notorious slum in the years of the industrial revolution, and at its northern end a now anonymous pauper’s burial ground conceals the bodies of up to 40,000 people. In recent years a vast sum of money from Hong Kong has been invested in regenerating the local district, and Angel Meadow, deemed a park these days, is slowly being […]
The work ‘From Old Mill To The End Of Empire’ was recently displayed as a slideshow as part of the Not Quite Light weekend. This is the slideshow. NOT QUITE LIGHT PRESENTS… from Simon Buckley on Vimeo.
DANTZIC STREET, 7.10AM I keep coming back to Dantzic Street. The bridges fascinate me, with the their dark, blue brick and tarnished tiles. I can find myself staring for quite some minutes at the silhouettes of people picked out by car headlights, as they pass under the rumbling ceilings which support the trains and trams. Sometimes, in the damp aftermath of Manchester rain I want to touch the walls, as if I’m earthing myself to the old city, and imagine […]
ANGEL MEADOW, IRK TOWN 7.29AM It’s been nearly a year since I started this incarnation of Not Quite Light. I was led to the idea by walking the unfamiliar streets around Irk Town, thinking of the lives buried under the turf of Angel Meadow which rests under the constant heat lamp glow of the CIS building. I’ve grown 12 months older now. Exploring my city in detail has brought me knew knowledge and a love and understanding of Manchester’s history […]
ANGEL MEADOW 7.37AM It wasn’t the Shortest Day after all. Never assume. I’d always thought that it fell on a fixed date, like Christmas, and didn’t think to check this basic fact. However, as I stood in Angel Meadow, I still believed that it was the Shortest Day. The unfinished moon lingering in the crisp, clear sky should have caused me to pause and wonder, but I’d decided that it was the Winter Solstice, and so therefore it was. Angel […]
DANTZIC STREET 6.48AM It’s funny what things you notice in adverts, that lodge in your brain and then are played back to you in coincidental, real life moments. I’d seen that the Milk Tray Man was being resurrected, which is an odd idea when you think about it. A stranger, a loner, breaks into the house of a single woman, and leaves some cheap chocolates for her, signifying that she’s not only being watched, but that her home is also […]
A PATCH OF GREEN, SWAN STREET 4.29AM I wasn’t intending to get up on this morning, but I was awoken by a panic dream, in which I was photographing in Manchester, but it was unrecognisable, and the dawn was taking away the darkness too quickly for me. So, unable to rest my mind, I left my bed and made my way down towards Victoria station. Along Swan Street two male friends were crossing towards the car park beneath the glowing […]
MJT MOTORS, GOULD STREET, 7.36AM My flatmate has a dog, an English Bull terrier. He’s a dapper man and reminds me a little of Bill Sykes as he proudly walks his pet through the Victorian streets behind Angel Meadows at night. Walking around the district that we live in is what has inspired Not Quite Light, as we talk about the history of the streets and buildings, and of our thoughts towards the encroaching modern world. In many ways, this […]
LUDGATE STREET, MANCHESTER, 7.06am I work in a simple fashion, and so it’s easy to set up once I notice something.. Just a digital camera, one short zoom and a tripod. I shoot more with a Colt 45, face to face, than as a sniper with all his telescopic sites. The morning was cold, not much love in the sky. I could tell nothing more was promised than solid grey. A car had pulled up opposite a waiting taxi, and […]