This series of drawings explores the landscape in which my maternal family roots unfolded.Through walking, researching and drawing I have begun to weave links together, between stories of the past and present: piecing together a puzzle that might re-connect my daughters and I back to some of our lost maternal lineage.

 

Census records, as well as half-remembered fragments of stories I had heard as a child, kept leading me back to a stretch of Watling St, not far from the Roman site of Wall (Letoceum). A fascinating section of the A5, steeped in ancient and industrial history, as well as half-forgotten family memories.

My Grandma was born on this stretch of road, and both her father and grandfather lived and worked here as miners in the local colliery at Chasewater. ​

 

The resulting series of drawings reflects a personal journey of hauntings, coincidences, memories and invisible connections through time; all embedded in the landscape of a short, unsung, stretch of the A5 and its surrounds.