After a successful exhibition a few years back, Mark Power and Daniel Cockrill are now self-publishing a book of the work “Destroying the Laboratory for the Sake of the Experiment, DTLFTSOTE”.

Beginning in 2006 and continuing (when time allowed) over the next four years, photographer Mark Power and poet Daniel Cockrill made several road trips across England, stopping at a range of towns and cities along the way. They were trying to better understand the rise of nationalism then (as now) evident in the UK, as well as notions of Englishness, concepts much discussed in the media at the time.

The project is a true collaboration, in that they always travelled together and experienced much the same things. As time progressed the pair witnessed their country slide into recession and the government introduce austerity measures, although little seemed to alter in the fabric of the landscape. What they did notice was something more abstract, more of a state of mind among the population as many began to blame others – and immigration in particular – for perceived misfortunes. Dan attempted to catch something of this mood in his poetry while Mark continued to photograph the backdrop against which the story unfolded.

Although they concluded the work in 2010 with an exhibition in London (in collaboration with the sculptor Jim Wilson and, in particular, the designer Dominic Brookman, who created several ‘treatments’ of poems and pictures) it was not until now that they’ve chosen to self-publish the book. Looking at the work today, with the benefit of hindsight, it’s possible to sense the changing mood in the country, of which last month’s BREXIT vote was perhaps the sad but inevitable conclusion.

Tuesday 6th Sept. Doors at 6pm, kicks off at 7pm. Free Entry at The Nightingale Rooms (above Grand Central, adjacent to the train station), Brighton. Free Entry.

The Grand Central,
The Nightingale Room
29-30 Surrey St,
Brighton BN1 3PA

<a href='https://miniclick.co.uk/2016/07/21/talk-mark-power/' target='_blank'>More information</a>

<i> Destroying the Laboratory for the Sake of the Experiment, DTLFTSOTE</i>
Published by Globtik Books (2016)
Designed by Dominic Brookman / Kenosha Design
Edition: 1500, signed by Mark Power
228 pages (Numerous colour photographs, 16 poems, illustrations, foldouts, die-cut pages, etc)
Hardback with foldout jacket, 250 x 160mm
ISBN: 978–0–9930830–1–3
£26