On Landscape - Any Questions Private

Tim Parkin (00:01.648)
Hello and welcome to On Landscape. Any questions? I'm here with our regular host, Joe Cornish, and our guest, Morag Patterson. Hi, Joe and Morag.

Morag (00:15.338)
Hi Tim, hi Joe, good to see you both.

Joe Cornish (00:16.955)
I'm Lauren. Bye.

Tim Parkin (00:18.052)
We've got a, as usual, a bunch of questions from readers, but we're also interested in talking about quite a few things with Morag as mentioned in our email that out recently. Firstly, I'd like to ask Morag what she's been up to recently. I believe you haven't updated the website, so it might be news for people.

Morag (00:39.022)
Yes, well recently I've been doing quite a bit of work collaborating with people around forests. So I've got a kind of year-long residency, self-directed residency working with a particular forester called Andrew McQueen in a forest team managers in Moffat. And so with that, we've been doing a lot of microscope work. So taking

One of the kind practical examples of what we've done is make settle plates, which is a kind of Petri dish with a kind of catching goo to use the simple phrase and a nutrient in it and to see what's floating around in the air, the kind of aerobiome of the forest, and then let that grow for a few days or a few weeks and then go and look at it under the microscope in the lab and photograph it. So that's the kind of the most recent.

Tim Parkin (01:15.394)
All right.

Morag (01:33.62)
and a bit early.

Tim Parkin (01:34.018)
I did see the microscope work on the website on the Instagram or Facebook.

Morag (01:38.542)
Yeah, because I did get them on Instagram, I think. Yeah, I'm honest to do that.

Tim Parkin (01:41.176)
Yeah, quite cool. Is this looking at fungus or anything?

Morag (01:45.064)
Yeah, it's whatever's in the air basically, but that does seem to be either fungi or bacteria on the whole. Yeah. And you can kind of tell the difference.

Joe Cornish (01:54.753)
What sort of magnifications are you working at?

Morag (01:57.774)
I'm going up to a lab in Edinburgh, which is an incredible place called ASCIS, which does arts and science collaborations. think the highest magnification is 100 times. I'm not much of an expert on the microscopes yet, but I'm pretty sure that's the furthest round optic. But there's two different types. You have the stereo microscopes, don't you, and then the binocular ones.

Tim Parkin (02:21.4)
Yeah, well, I'm going ask you a question about that because I did put it in the email about the microscope work. I'm intrigued as how you feel about the creative part of that in terms of because microscopes are scientific instruments, but they are just cameras at the end of the day. What flexibility do you have and how have you been approaching that?

Morag (02:36.492)
Yeah, yeah, for sure.

Morag (02:43.31)
So far, I haven't been manipulating anything on the plates, as it were, and the slides in any more than you would just to prepare it as a sort of scientific trial. And I think that's mainly at this stage because I've just been so excited by what I see there. You know, I see the slide or I see the plate even not looking in a microscope and then look at it in the microscope and then I'm just so blown away.

Tim Parkin (03:00.708)
Yeah.

Morag (03:10.008)
that I'm not going any further than just taking the photo of it at the moment. And none of those are processed any more than, you know, little tiny process that were on Instagram. But of course there is opportunity there with a bit more time and a fair wind to be working with that in a bit more depth. Yeah, yeah, it's so fascinating and it just, needs quite a lot of time. Like, I mean,

Tim Parkin (03:28.624)
It'll be really interesting.

Morag (03:39.534)
Before we started on this one where we were collecting from the air, took roots and we're doing mycorrhizae. So you make a preparation for that where you need to put it in potassium hydroxide for a certain amount of time because you need to clean the roots. If you over clean them, you don't see anything. So you've kind of stripped it all away. If you don't clean them enough, you can't see anything. And so then you stain it. So with a...

you know, tends to be a blue or a purple dye so that they show up on the plates. And the first time I went into the lab, I'd collected like a carrier bag full of stuff from two different sites in his forest. And then when you get to prepping your slides, you you realise you're dealing with taking something that's the size of the tip of your fingernail. And even then with a full day booked, a full day for prep and a full day for looking at the things.

Tim Parkin (04:09.828)
Yeah.

Tim Parkin (04:23.64)
Yeah.

Morag (04:34.638)
under the microscopes, there was nowhere near enough time to feel like you looked at everything and saw it and were able to kind of be able to process the sort of magnitude of those tiny, tiny worlds going on. So.

Joe Cornish (04:50.707)
I mean, I just think that's just the most fascinating account that you've given us there, because it also sparks off so many different ways of thinking about how photography can be used to either amplify, emphasize, or interpret something that we can't see. And if we take the opposite example, we see quite a lot coming back from the James Webb.

Morag (05:09.698)
Mm.

Joe Cornish (05:18.011)
space telescope now, don't we? And as far as I understand it, all of those, well, many of the colours will be kind of enhanced, quite simply they're outside of the visible spectrum anyway. And yet for us to really encounter them, to experience them, have to see them in some colour or other. And then it's really, I suppose, to some extent, down to the interpretation of the scientists using their artistic skills, you know, to bring out the wonder of the universe.

Morag (05:18.542)
Thank you.

Morag (05:28.27)
Mm-hmm.

Morag (05:46.488)
Mm.

Joe Cornish (05:47.087)
And in a way, you could be doing the same and you're at an early stage as you're saying, but it does sort of make me feel it's incredibly exciting. I'm not saying one should disnify the colours that you're looking at, but the way that you translate the colours and the tones could be very significant in how it helps us to understand what you're seeing.

Morag (06:00.342)
Mm-hmm.

Morag (06:10.188)
Yeah, absolutely. And the textures and the shapes as well as the colour and also I think, you know, because there's been a lot of conversation about the whole, I suppose you could call it Disneyfication or humanfication of the wood wide web as it were when it comes to MicroRiser. But, you know, at the end of the day, so many people, more people are engaged with that subject now and have awareness of it because of that.

So although there's some purists saying that was ridiculous, it went too far. There's a lot of people saying, well, actually hang on a minute. Like a lot of people are engaged with that now. people knowing about soil and fungi and the kind of microbiology of all of that is so important. So, yeah.

Tim Parkin (06:45.85)
Yep.

Joe Cornish (06:56.211)
Well, we accepted black and white photography. We still do accept black and white photography, which inherently abstracts the world away, you know, gets rid of the difficult colors of the kind of grungy colors, let's say, you know, and almost like purifies the world. Nobody objects to that. I think it's really a question of intent. And it probably leads all the way back, Tim, to, you know, the...

Morag (07:00.738)
Yeah.

Morag (07:08.91)
Mm-hmm.

Morag (07:16.717)
No.

Joe Cornish (07:25.105)
natural landscape for the tour of the year if we're not careful.

Tim Parkin (07:26.672)
I was going to mention that because it wasn't the natural landscape, but it's a wildlife photographer of the year awards where there are regularly microscope entries. And they do clever things like use UV spectroscopy or mono wavelength light to try and stimulate reactions or combine to exaggerate colors, etc. And we did have a few conversations about is this real? Same thing about using UV to stimulate responses in

Morag (07:36.398)
Mm-hmm.

Morag (07:41.346)
Mm-hmm. Yep.

Yeah.

Morag (07:48.876)
Yeah.

Tim Parkin (07:56.388)
fungus or scorpions or things like that.

Morag (07:57.656)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. It's a kind of, it's a big wide world of possibilities there, isn't it? And yeah, haven't, you know, I'm just using the very straightforward lab equipment at the moment and what's there, because I suppose the other part of the creativity of the project and the importance of it is the amount of time spent in the forest and the conversations and the thinking. You know, this idea came out of...

a lot of conversation and lot of walking and talking in the forest, know, so a lot of it's in the process and the gathering and the thinking, as well as the actual the photograph. So, and, you know, we haven't had time, we, you know, we've photographed that first batch of results, but we haven't had time to process them. We haven't had time to like Google lens them and go to experts and ask.

What are we looking at here? What might each of those things mean? What does it do? What's its function in the ecosystem? And then we have no idea where those conversations lead us, which is really nice. To have a residency with such free rein like that is incredible, that your outcome is made by the walking, basically.

Tim Parkin (09:00.805)
Yeah.

Tim Parkin (09:11.856)
I was stunned by the amount of fungus, because when I was doing my mountain leader training, one of the things I thought I'd look at was funguses and lichens, et cetera. I realized when I started looking at lichens, there was something like, I think it was 4,000 Scottish lichens. That's the surface one, one representative of one subclass of fungi.

Morag (09:30.284)
Yeah.

Morag (09:35.574)
Yeah, it's staggering, isn't it? We started to scratch the surface of that during lockdown, you know, did some courses on mosses and lichens and then, you know, listening to podcasts about that relationship between, you know, fungi and algae and all the rest of it and whether those things, whether they've become a compound new thing, I think, believe they can split apart again, can't they? They don't become assimilated into a permanently changed structure. And then that

just, yeah, my mind just goes like, there's wow, there's so much to look at there.

Joe Cornish (10:11.347)
It's great to hear your sense of, you know, that you've got that still that sense of wonder about what you're looking at. you know, I think ultimately, when it comes to if you choose to publish the work or put it in the public domain, you know, to allow your kind of artistic instincts to, you know, to be at the fore, I'm pretty sure that if you do decide to, you know, to write with it as well, that's going to help. I mean, not that the work won't

be more than interesting enough in its own right visually, clearly the stories behind, especially just hearing you talk about walking through the forest and what you experienced there, and then somehow using these sort of highly powerful scientific instruments to go to another level within the world that is invisible below the surface. I mean, I just think it's terrifically exciting. And for me, it's always...

been the biggest problem really with the World Wide Web is the fact, or the Wood Wide Web rather, the fact that we can't see it. So finding ways of kind of visually accounting for its wonder or expressing it is, you know, it's going to be valuable culturally as well as enjoyable artistically.

Morag (11:29.664)
Yeah, thanks, Joe. I hope it will be. I mean, we're already starting to do little pieces of writing and visuals about the project as we go along, kind of, you know, things that I wouldn't normally be working with as a photographer, like the Forestry Journal, you know, so a publication that's entirely read by foresters and commercial foresters, you know, and sorry, a whole wide range of foresters. You know, so it's interesting then working as well in

It's the interdisciplinary kind of part of it as well, think that really helps feed that kind of creativeness and the enthusiasm. know, because Andrew will say something that just, yeah, it leads me off down so many.

Joe Cornish (12:15.187)
Thanks.

Tim Parkin (12:15.629)
You can't help but feed into your photography, your normal photography either. As soon as you've learned all that information, you just look at things differently. can't help but.

Morag (12:24.896)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely, absolutely. And one of the other things we'll do at some point before the summer probably is trying to do some sort of participatory event there in the forest as well. You know, some kind of walk and talk. We don't know what that will look like yet. So we've got to we're still, you know, still creating as we go kind of thing.

Tim Parkin (12:47.056)
Well, I should move on to some of the questions we've had asked. I'm going to start with one from Tony Martin, if I can read on my phone, it's not particularly great. I would be interested in asking the panel, that's us by the way, the following. If you were unable to ever show your work to anyone ever again, would you carry on making your work? I guess I'm really asking for their thoughts on the drivers for the work being a balance of communication versus self-expression, which obviously varies.

How does that sound, Morag?

Morag (13:18.158)
Yeah, I would because I think I probably alluded to it just now. So much of it is about the process for me these days. Like the end result is nice and it's great to show it to people and get to have a nice response or reaction or a conversation. But I would say for me, it's 75 % process and only 25 % the end result, I think.

It's always hard to say something like that because I might feel completely different in two years and I might have felt different two years ago, but that's, think, where I am now.

Tim Parkin (13:50.0)
There was a very good story told by a friend of ours of going on a holiday to America, photographic holiday, and they took a large format camera with a bunch of quick slides and spent maybe two weeks taking pictures, having the time of the life and coming back and finding out that the quick holder wasn't working. So she hadn't actually exposed any film whatsoever. But the interesting thing was she still had a fantastic time, loved the process.

Morag (14:14.658)
Yeah.

Morag (14:20.204)
Yeah. Yeah.

Tim Parkin (14:20.208)
still remember all the photographs that were taken. And I thought that was a great example of separating the product from the process and what it gives you.

Morag (14:26.646)
Yeah. Yeah, great example.

Joe Cornish (14:31.407)
I yeah, if I can jump in because I also want to hear what what your view on it is Tim, but as a really good answer from Moraga, I definitely the longer time goes on, the more true that is for me that I just I'm more than happy just doing going out with my camera. mean, I just think that is the it's really not 90 percent of it. In fact, now that I don't have a gallery, I don't have to worry about anybody else.

actually, apart from me. Yes, it's nice to show work and it's nice to get good feedback and you feel a certain, you can be useful to this, to people by showing your work and talking about it. And that's a kind of duty in a way. But without a doubt, the only reason for me to take pictures is because I love taking pictures. Even if there were no other reason for it. It helps me to kind of centre myself, I think on

being alive in the moment and out in nature. These are sort of words and phrases and ideas I might not have used 25 years ago, but as time goes by and you do more education and whatnot, you realize that what you're really doing is doing something you love. And we're incredibly privileged on the whole to do photography. It's one of the... I mean, it's a modern, on the face of it, a modern thing, relatively speaking, in human history.

And yet the fact that it allows you gives you a kind of permission to go out and study the world around you. You you don't have to kill an animal or anything like that, you know, hunting sense, but you're still kind of using some of the same skills that our ancestors used. And I do think that's something that connects quite deeply as well as the kind of superficial pleasure of just looking at things for its own sake. So yeah, for me, I just

I love doing it and doesn't matter whether it gets published or not. In fact, most of my pictures never see the light of day anyway. And what about you, Mr. Parkin?

Tim Parkin (16:40.304)
It's a good one because I've done quite a bit of photography over the last four years, but I haven't shown much of it to anybody at all because it's been mostly when I've been out mountaineering or climbing and I've not done it specifically. It's been record shots, but I can't help just, I can't just take a record shot. It still ends up as a photograph and that's part of the process. But like you said, Joe, it's something that's been going on beyond photography with the people who did the grand tour.

Morag (17:02.094)
Mm-hmm.

Tim Parkin (17:09.84)
and doing their sketchbooks, learning to sketch when they were young or watercolour sketch. They would be doing exactly the same thing as we're doing in terms of wandering around and using the process of looking to alter the way they experience the world. And it's the same way you're talking about learning about the micro rhizomes and fungi, that the stuff you know and the process you use changes the way you interact with the world.

Morag (17:39.117)
Mm.

Tim Parkin (17:40.444)
I do want to go out and do more photography in terms of classical photography. And I think sharing is a part of it. But I think liking that story about the lady who lost her pictures, they're two separate things. Being out and taking the pictures is one thing. Deciding or whether or not to share them and how to share them is another thing. And I think separating those two things out like that can be quite helpful and saying, well, it doesn't matter.

Morag (17:58.115)
Hmm.

Tim Parkin (18:10.03)
what you're doing in terms of wandering around and taking pictures. You don't need to think about success or not. It's about interacting. And then when it comes home and you're processing them, then you can decide how to share them, what's useful. I I've had a recent chat with a book publisher and a book shop in Fort William who were asking for a tourist book.

I was thinking, well, that'd be quite nice to do, actually. I wonder if you can do a tourist book and make it creatively interesting at the same time. And so I think that's quite a nice driver. And then again, there's taking pictures. I'd like to do a book of my own work just for the sake of it. So they're all different ways of sharing.

Morag (18:49.774)
Mm.

Morag (18:57.814)
Yeah, you might be able to do both at the same time, Tim, the shot for the book and the shot for you and then compare the two. It'd be really interesting.

Tim Parkin (19:04.464)
I know and you can have them in little boxes next to each other. I think somebody's done that before. It was Clare's book. But no, I think I would. I would still be taking pictures. I still will be enjoying it. And I think it would probably change what I did a little bit. How would it change it?

Morag (19:09.73)
Bye bye.

Joe Cornish (19:11.985)
So much.

Tim Parkin (19:30.608)
I don't know. I think I'd be going out with a different goal in mind, just to wander instead. So the walking would become the most important thing. And then the photographing.

Morag (19:39.126)
Hmm.

Joe Cornish (19:39.699)
It's interesting because I'll bet, Morag, you obviously have a sense that you must have a sense of purpose and mission in what you do. And clearly, if you take your current project, there's a very, very strict limitation on what you can do. And those limitations sort of set the and perhaps give you the energy as well to continue it. And I wonder if I'm just thinking back from my own experience doing books in the past.

which in exactly solve, trying to solve the problem that you're describing, Tim, where you, you know, your client requires an illustration, but you want to do something that you love and that you get excited about. And, and so in the end, maybe you do two different versions or more likely you actually do what you want to do and hope for the best. And that's certainly what I did. Most of the time it did work out, but, but I also think that is something, there is something really nice that

Morag (20:26.606)
Thank

Joe Cornish (20:35.623)
but I'm powerful about having a project like the one that you described more.

Morag (20:43.02)
Yeah, absolutely. It's funny because I've now you say it is limiting in the same way like zero footprint was limiting. with this project, it's just felt hugely expansive for me, like the possibilities seem huge, even though I suppose there's some constraints and there's some boundaries, isn't there? My only constraint really with that project, because I wouldn't even have to do photography, is place.

That's the place and the subject of forest and forest ecology and forest policy and forest management. That's my constraint. So I do have that and a place. But in terms of that kind of what we can explore and the avenues that we can go down, we're wide open. So it's a nice combination of those two things, I think.

Tim Parkin (21:27.024)
I think the problem with doing anything and not having any constraints is it's almost a non-understandable infinity of choices. if you choose something smaller like the zero footprint, it's still an infinite number of choices you can use. But you can start to understand them and engage with it, perhaps.

Morag (21:36.916)
Yeah, and why am I doing it and where am I going? Yeah.

Morag (21:43.244)
Yeah.

Yeah, you've given yourself a bit of a boundary and a bit of a framework to work within. Yeah, and then you can just take it forward. But yeah, I mean, I do tend to kind of blow along in the wind with what I do, rather than be super intentional, if that makes sense. I mean, you have known me for quite a long time now and have seen me do a lot of different types of projects.

there was the zero footprint and then Tim, think it was you, when I was doing cyanotypes, pointed me to the anthotype book, which I bought straight away and just got lost in anthotypes of all descriptions for a very long time because they take a long time to make, a long time to expose. And then went on to the point where I was just boiling the plants straight into paper, you know, which is...

Tim Parkin (22:28.933)
Yeah

Tim Parkin (22:34.254)
Yeah, really good results, yeah.

Morag (22:36.722)
is an incredible thing and then dyeing cloth from plants and then tying the plants into cloth and you know so I seen I don't know it's not the ideas I have definitely just come out of nowhere or the universe somewhere they're not something I never sit down and kind of like really think something through and put the limits and the boundaries it all just seems to happen quite organically because I'm a bit

Joe Cornish (22:59.889)
I think that that's describing the ideal kind of creative process is to allow yourself to be kind of open to everything that's happening and that you perceive in the world and not to shut doors and to be in a kind of state of flow. I know that's a bit of a cliche now, but I mean, that is the ideal is it. I actually think that

Morag (23:05.742)
Mm.

Joe Cornish (23:28.195)
certainly for me in the past, having projects and let's say commercial obligations was creatively quite limiting. And I used to get bogged down in that, whereas I think it's really lovely if you can just allow yourself to be open to any possibility. And also means you're more likely to be productive, but perhaps more to the point, you're more likely to be expressive, to actually find ways of

Morag (23:38.094)
Mm.

Morag (23:54.862)
Yeah.

Joe Cornish (23:57.049)
making a point that will actually probably resonate for others as well rather than it being forced or kind of formulaic. So I mean it sounds sounds great.

Morag (24:07.512)
Yeah, thank you.

Tim Parkin (24:07.824)
Have you worked with any scientific people? mean, it's like I'm thinking of Morag obviously, but almost thinking of Colin Pryor's work with the egg specialists and bird specialists. you worked with geologists at one point?

Joe Cornish (24:22.035)
I haven't. mean, I know, well, my son is sort of geologist, I suppose, and I have done a lot of had quite a lot of collaborations with with geologists of but only quite superficially in the past. I got a friend who's a an atmospheric scientist, who's who's looking to do some collaboration. And it and that's super exciting. I mean, I just think that collaboration was one of the things that

I was proposing we discuss with Morag, who's an absolute expert in it. But it's also one of those things that opens up photography for you. I wish I could tell you I'd done some fantastically scientific things, but I haven't. I still think that I'd like to work with my son on a book project, because actually, although Sam is basically a climate scientist,

Morag (24:53.987)
Mm.

Joe Cornish (25:19.229)
but he's just a brilliant writer on science. that's the thing I find hard is I still use adjectives and whatnot. And if you're a good science writer, you're not supposed to do that. But he's able to describe the world in a way that is very lyrical and poetic without using any kind of fakery. And I don't know how he does it, but I guess it's a kind of combination of being a sensitive

person and yet having a scientific discipline. So that's the sort of thing I would very much like to do. But there are so many different collaborations that we can do, be it with scientists or with other artists. And Morag, you've done more than just work with other scientists, I think, or foresters.

Morag (26:08.63)
Yeah, for sure. mean, on the science question specifically, just started over the last few months. So this is in its very, very early stages. Hopefully doing a project for a local community. Well, it's sort of like a community slash forestry and land Scotland forest over to the west of here. And that is with the same forester that I'm working with in Moffat and a scientist called Petra Guy.

who does soil science and is a mycorrhizal specialist and the community group in the forest want, are giving us the space to dream up our ideal interdisciplinary project. Yeah, so a forest to me and Petra who's the soil scientist. And I think we did our first R &D day and I feel like, I think we were still in that mindset that they want us to give results that we can show people and

you know, translate information and education for the community group. And then they said, that's all lovely. We really love what you came up with there. But what we want you two to do is work out how you could all do something really exciting that would help you grow professionally, creatively, and really use that true interdisciplinary kind of magic that happens when you all start talking across your disciplines and see what comes out of that. So that's...

like really exciting and to be given the space to think that up in the first place rather than someone tell you what you're going to do is amazing. So we're meeting again on Saturday. So that one would be really, really excited about that. And yeah, I'm thinking I've done other collaborations with gosh, all sorts of people. mean, some street artists. We did a rural mural project. So

Tim Parkin (27:40.634)
Yeah.

Morag (28:04.862)
you know, they were the kind of lead on the project and they worked with me and we introduced photography, but then translated that into these two huge street murals, one which was on like a five-story building in Glasgow. And the process of that and how they translate objects, shapes, colours, motifs, all of that sort of thing was just extraordinary.

Tim Parkin (28:19.92)
Yeah.

Joe Cornish (28:31.015)
How exciting.

Tim Parkin (28:31.024)
I have to ask you because I'm intrigued by it all and I was part of trying to help a little bit with the Loch Arben National Park. Are you going to be doing anything with your national park potentially?

Morag (28:42.094)
We are, we're trying to do a creative consultation right now, which will be historic, I guess, by the time this goes out, because the first one is on Sunday and the second one is the Sunday after. Yeah, mean, unfortunately, the tone of the debate around the National Park has been really inflammatory and kind of hostile and very, very polarised. It's been, yeah, to the point where there's lots of people who are just really afraid.

Tim Parkin (28:52.674)
Okay.

Tim Parkin (29:04.203)
Same here. Yeah.

Morag (29:10.382)
to enter conversations about it. And of course, consultations tend to be quite, what would you call it? Just dry and boring and not very accessible a lot of the time. Ted and I, is, also, there's lots of other questions that need to come up about the future, regardless of a park or not. Like, how do we manage things for the environment and communities? And how do we set up fair governance structures

with accountability and local representation. So we're going to lead, we've designed a questionnaire which is online and we're going to lead two walks where we've set up a set of questions that we feel hopefully seed really nice conversation, really productive conversation, and then we'll gather that back in and just put it into the consultation, but it also hopefully is usable going forward. And that's...

that's not actually a photographic project, I guess, but you know, we've become, because we do a lot of other work around the environment and local things and lots of volunteering, you know, there's a big, big overlap now between when we're like working as artists or just working as community. So, but that is...

Tim Parkin (30:12.526)
Yeah.

Joe Cornish (30:27.325)
As a matter of interest, when you do that, because I think that's such an interesting, as it were, byproduct of your artistic life, is that you're now consulted about aspects of governance and land management. And people care about what you think, as well as what you can do and what you can create.

And I mean, just out of curiosity, do you get paid for that? is that just always on a kind of voluntary basis?

Morag (30:57.358)
That particular project is a commission, there's a big move about involving arts and culture in everyday business governance politics in every part of life down in the South, so we're lucky enough to have people who will commission bits of work like that. A lot of the work I do around forestry, because a lot of it has centred around forestry and land use change actually for me and communities, a lot of that is for free.

I would say like probably 75 % if not more of what I do for that is free. But then, you know, it's just so totally intersected with the, you know, my creative life as well now that it all just becomes one big kind of blur in a way.

Joe Cornish (31:43.775)
And it comes with the territory and it's not as if one should be sort of transactional about everything, far from it. I was just curious really, because it's great, I think, that actually that local community groups benefit from your expertise and understanding. I think it's sometimes, we all get siloed in the world, we? And it's so tempting to say, well,

Morag (31:49.175)
Mm.

Joe Cornish (32:11.729)
This is a scientist issue, but actually scientists increasingly in my experience seem to be mindful of the fact that there are things they can't do. They can maybe analyze and explain certain things, but they can't necessarily connect or share them effectively without an artistic input. And I think that, you know, it requires that these cross-disciplinary collaborations have got

Morag (32:20.824)
Mm-hmm.

Joe Cornish (32:37.927)
put the potential to have great value. And it's actually really encouraging to hear that there seem to be now an increasing number of interest in using the sciences, sorry, in using the arts to help illuminate things that otherwise have a kind of scientific basis, you know, or, or I mean, National Trust, for example, you know, when they're working on restoration, regeneration projects in my part of the world, they're usually using, using artists as well.

Morag (32:52.92)
Yeah.

Joe Cornish (33:07.581)
might be painters, sculptors or photographers to help them to either get their message across or just to do something that will create engagement with the local community.

Morag (33:18.188)
Yeah, think just one on and it is really encouraging that all of that's happening, but there is a bigger untapped potential that we're just starting to see creep in, which is thinking about arts and culture beyond illustration and communication and engagement and actually, you know, being one of the tools that helps people think differently and helps.

you know, sort of working our way out of the paradigm that we're all kind of stuck in at the moment in terms of, you know, climate and environment. I mean, there's one really good concrete example down here where there's a, it's called the Crichton Carbon Centre and they work mainly around soil and peatlands. And they've actually taken an artist on now two days a week, I think it is, in a permanent role, not as an illustrator or as a communicator, but because the

the scientist person realises how much having an artist in there changes the thinking and the potential for thought across the whole spectrum. know, like getting right down to the grassroot nuggets of ideas in the first place.

Tim Parkin (34:24.368)
One of the things I noticed when I moved up to the Highlands here is that one is that local politics is very accessible. It's hard to avoid in many ways. And that goes through to environmental and housing and everything else. But the environment is really an important part of that. And if you get involved in many of these activities,

Morag (34:33.803)
Mm-hmm.

Morag (34:41.102)
Mm-hmm.

Tim Parkin (34:52.664)
it's a lot of artists get involved in it. Whether that's because of the time they have available or the passion they have for the subject. But yeah, there's a lot of people doing important things.

Morag (34:54.765)
Yeah.

Morag (35:02.327)
Yeah.

Morag (35:06.528)
Yeah, kind of crossing across the two things. Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, don't know what what it's like down in England, Joe, but it does seem, you know, Scotland does seem pretty accessible. Yeah, from that point of view, as you said.

Joe Cornish (35:19.379)
Yeah, I mean, Scotland does seem very idyllic in lots of ways. But having said that, you know, we have we have a lot going on here in terms of the environment. Jenny is part of the local climate action group in our local villages. And, you know, I initially thought, you know, she and I were the only people in the our part of the world who cared about these things. But that's just not true at all. And there's a huge number of people both

with scientific and artistic and academic backgrounds who are doing their level best to try to change the paradigm as you put it, Morag. And it's not easy to do, as you know. It requires probably more understanding of human nature and psychology than it does about arts or science, to be honest. Getting people to change their minds about things or to feel that they have a stake in the future. I mean, I've believed for

30 or 40 years really ever since I started working as a photographer and unable to work with the National Trust back in the 1980s, that you could be part of a conversation about conservation as I thought of it then. And that's only grown really since then. I think that the arts are kind of critical. Nevertheless, I think it's easier in smaller communities.

to make a difference. So Tim, I think that's what you're reflecting on there really. the fact that if you think, yeah, indeed, and you're more dependent on one another, I think of your village beside the Loch and you could be snowed in or you are relatively isolated because you're not far from Fort William and not that far from Plasco, but in a...

Tim Parkin (36:52.344)
It's easy to discover things definitely.

Joe Cornish (37:13.427)
In landscape terms, the mountains separate you from the rest of the world and the weather dominates your experience. South of the border, apart from maybe in the lakes, that's not really true anywhere. Well, that's probably people on the A66 wouldn't agree, but on the whole, further south you go, the landscape is just there. It's kind of more of a background. So you can get on with it most of the time. Having said that, flooding is increasingly a problem.

Morag (37:41.678)
in

Joe Cornish (37:42.457)
as we're finding. I guess, you know, I feel that, you know, that probably all of us and many of the people listening will be very mindful and aware of this. You know, we've all seen change through our lifetimes and we're concerned because on the whole people who look at nature, you know, see those changes and love nature and want it to thrive. We're all interested in biodiversity and we believe that the more we know and understand

the more we know that the mystery of the creation of the world opens up before us and the more there is to discover. it's all wonderful. And it's that lack of connection that's holding us back and holding society back from the change that we need. So to my mind, know, whatever we can do to help others without hectoring or lecturing, you know, that's where we should be.

Morag (38:36.994)
Yeah.

Joe Cornish (38:41.063)
where we should be at.

Morag (38:42.55)
Yeah, and I mean, there's huge benefits just for people on a personal level, you know, never mind the biodiversity and the climate crisis, that connection and the wonder and the curiosity and the feeling, you know, just generally connected to something bigger is so important psychologically and for people's wellbeing, I think. You know, we've all got kind of

I'm not saying all of us, but many of us, including me, definitely get into that kind of habit of like buying something or the next thing or looking forward to something, you know, as opposed to sort of like staying really grounded in ourselves and in the moment and in our surroundings and really just enjoying being, you know, in a time and place. know, so it's even if, even if we're not looking at the bigger picture stuff, I think that's really important for folks.

Tim Parkin (39:38.288)
I've got a question from David Mapleton. He says, I'm a 79 year old and I'm a fan of landscape photography. I've had diploma from the Banff School of Art and have taught photography in Vancouver night school for over 10 years. I'm finding recently that my admiration of any particular landscape photograph I happen to be viewing is being severely clouded by the influx of AI into nearly everything electronic and certainly photography.

Manipulation at the output stage is nothing new, but I've always been able to recognize cooking in a photograph. But now I'm not so sure and frankly it is ruining my appreciation of a great capture. My question is, should I be conflicted or should I just accept that AI is just another part of the photographic or creative process? It's one of those AI questions, a different take, yeah.

Joe Cornish (40:29.021)
Tim, you'll probably be even better qualified than me and Morag.

Tim Parkin (40:32.496)
It's different people's take on it. have a personal take on it, but I'm intrigued on whether there are... AI is a polarizing thing, it seems. The more you look at it, the more you can see advantages, but it will be exploited. In terms of visually, can see instances where it might be useful in what you're potentially.

forgetting about ethical side of things, but I'm interested in what you think and what your experiences of it have been so far more aggdy.

Morag (41:09.474)
Dabbled with a collaboration on it as part of a much wider, we were doing, this was another artist residency last year looking at night jazz, looking at their migration and the risks to their habitat because we have a local population here in the summer. And so we did a whole big wide range of things. Some of it was photography, some of it was cyanotype, some of it was cyanolumines, some of it was anthotypes on cloth.

But one thing I did was a little picture where I collaborated with AI by, I took my own picture, maybe two pictures even, and then I described to AI this very meditative, reflective experience I was having of waiting on a bog for like three hours till the sun went down and the midges were there waiting for the night jazz. And then let the AI generate a picture of what I was seeing and feeling.

and then put all the three pictures together and then also asked it to write a meditation on the back. It had it as a little postcard.

Morag (42:12.598)
I think I probably just did that to get it out my system, you know, just to say, like I've, I've had a look at that. and, know, just. Yeah. And also because it is a really important subject to talk about well beyond photography, of course, anyway. So I feel like it's important from that point of view, but then also, I don't know, because there's so much AI just in automated processing now anyway, isn't there, you know, some of the automations that you can do as AI.

Tim Parkin (42:19.438)
Yeah, you can't talk about something unless you've tried it, can you?

Tim Parkin (42:39.428)
Yeah.

Morag (42:42.35)
I have certainly seen other people saying they're really fed up because they can't tell on their newsfeed now whether something's a real photo or not. I think as with almost this would be my answer to any question is, know, do what you think is right for yourself at the time and just don't worry about what other people are doing.

Tim Parkin (43:06.382)
Yeah, it is difficult for people who are trying to appreciate photography. And this is one of our trailers for the natural landscape awards in terms of authenticity and the wildlife photography of the year. Thoughts about it a long time about how do we tell how important it is because it's getting so good now that you can create almost anything and the control is.

Morag (43:10.232)
Yeah.

Morag (43:27.722)
Yeah. So is it more a point about honesty and transparency as well?

Tim Parkin (43:32.494)
I think that's what David Marble-Ton was asking about.

Morag (43:34.911)
the questions heading towards. Yeah, yeah, I mean, I would just hope that that would be a rule in a competition.

Tim Parkin (43:42.904)
It should be, I think. I mean, I can see there are, I don't want to get into the ethical side of things because I have my own point of view, whether, the idea that AI is copying everybody else's art styles is one thing. And I think that's a bit of a double-edged sword because it's what we do as photographers, quite often reading books, we use our source material. And we look at social media and copy things essentially in a very similar way, according to how.

Morag (43:56.722)
yeah, for sure.

Morag (44:03.682)
Mm.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Tim Parkin (44:12.112)
AI works. What social media? Yeah, exactly. Just books for you. But there is, I can see uses for it. For instance, if I was doing a project, let's say I was working on a microrisome style project, I could, as part of that work with an illustrator, spend a lot of time describing what I'm trying to create with an illustrator. It would.

Joe Cornish (44:12.413)
What social media?

Joe Cornish (44:19.987)
Thanks.

Tim Parkin (44:41.902)
It would cost a lot of money. It would be a collaboration because I wouldn't be able to describe exactly what I wanted to see. And I couldn't keep on saying, well, no, it different than that, or I want to change it. So I can see aspects of AI being very useful in order to get somebody who isn't visually oriented or can't paint or draw to be able to create something that goes straight into what they're thinking and how they want to express.

Morag (44:49.07)
Mm.

Tim Parkin (45:09.624)
And you could say that in the way that photography did for painters, it lets illustrators be more creative with what they want to do and how they do it so they can work at a higher level with things. It's a tough one, that one is, though, but I can definitely see an advantage in some cases.

Morag (45:26.732)
Hmm.

Joe Cornish (45:27.603)
I mean, my my thought is coming from originally from a commercial photography background, that commercial photographers will inevitably all use AI, whether they would like to or not, probably because it's so convenient and so powerful now. I, I, I'm not actually sure whether I ever do use AI, perhaps, Morag, as you're suggesting, you know, almost by mistake, because it might

B, that Lightroom has a bit of AI that I'm not even aware of, or Capture One or Photoshop. But when I go out with my camera, there's a difference. If I use a phone, it's brilliant at making pictures of difficult high contrast subjects because it mashes pictures together. And you can do these long exposures handheld, and it takes several pictures, mashes them together, and noise cancel. I mean, it's incredible technology. I'm not sure if that's

counts as AI or whether that's just computational photography. But honestly, most of the time, I still think there's something about a straight picture. Then it's sensitively edited, whether whether that uses AI or not that allows us to connect with that emotion internally, but you know, it's kind of catalyzed by the scene in front of you. And, you know, that's

Tim Parkin (46:28.708)
be some in that yeah.

Morag (46:45.09)
Hmm.

Joe Cornish (46:54.289)
That's the photographer's kind of, I don't want use the word genius, but you know, when it works, when you get it right and a picture is able to evoke something, I think it should feel real. that, for me, that reality is quite important. I know that, you know, there's all sorts of ways of using photography that are not based on a strictly descriptive view of the world.

But where it works, and that's the intention, any intervention from an artificial source is unwelcome, I would say. But I mean, who knows? It would be lovely. My main worry, to be honest, is less about how it affects photography, but how it affects human creativity more generally, and whether people will use it wisely, like Morag, or just be lazy and lose all their creativity in the process.

Morag (47:40.536)
Mm.

Tim Parkin (47:45.795)
Yeah.

Morag (47:49.312)
Yeah, and we were just talking about connection before, we, and how important that is from multiple aspects. And if part of what makes one of UTI's photos really beautiful or interesting or, you know, provokes an emotion is probably the connection that you were having in that place and time and what you were feeling, you know, what your mood was, what motivated you that day, you know, what happened to catch your eye. And yeah, whether you have that

same thing at the computer, I just don't know.

Tim Parkin (48:22.332)
One of the reassuring things I think about AI is it can only work with what's out there. that because there are lots of photographs of, let's say, Bookalletive Moor, or there's lots of photographs of the Lake District, it can be very good at producing these long range pictures of mountain ranges, et cetera. What it can't be very good at is doing things that it won't have. So for instance, your microisrae zone or your local area. It can't produce pictures because there's no source material there for it.

Joe Cornish (48:22.491)
I heard it.

Morag (48:47.566)
Yeah.

Tim Parkin (48:51.92)
So I think that potentially the way photographers can now differentiate themselves is to do more personal work, things that aren't already out there in the mainstream. So it could open windows.

Morag (49:00.397)
Mm-hmm.

Joe Cornish (49:06.279)
But it is, to go back to David's point, Tim, that it is an interesting question and I'm kind of sad for him that he's experiencing this crisis of faith in a way in photography, because I think that faith does come into it in a way, that sense of belief that you have in the reality of what you're looking at and that you can believe it. I mean, I can't think of a better word for it really.

So it's a shame, I'd sort of try to encourage them to keep the faith and hope for the best. I think there will always be photographers going out there with their cameras, you know, in whatever way, whether it's somebody who's creative as Morag or somebody who's relatively boring and stuck in their ways like me, you know, doing what they do. So, and still, you know, creating with no intent other than to be, you know, use your natural ideas to...

to come through. I think that's ultimately very, very important. It's not that AI is no substitute for that.

Tim Parkin (50:07.824)
Isn't it?

I think David could do well, instead of following a random stream of photographers, is pick photographers that you know have a good relationship with their subject matter and what they do. And so in other words, don't just look for pictures, look for photographers.

Morag (50:19.808)
and

Morag (50:27.434)
Yeah, don't let the algorithms decide for you.

Tim Parkin (50:30.158)
Yeah.

Joe Cornish (50:30.406)
Absolutely. Well, that was a good question. Have you got any other good questions there, Tim?

Tim Parkin (50:34.16)
I haven't got any more on the end of here, so you're going to have to come up with a question, Unless Morag would like to discuss the topic. I have an interesting question. There is, or has been in landscape photography, an understanding that there is quite a bit of non-representation for women photographers. And we've looked at the number of people who enter our competition and we think there's probably about

Joe Cornish (50:38.897)
That won't be difficult.

Morag (50:57.944)
Mm-hmm.

Tim Parkin (51:03.728)
20, 25 % women to maybe 75, 80 % men. In landscape photography and other genres, it's different. But I've got friends who work as a couple together. And this was a while ago, but they had difficulty as a woman finding representation in women's photography because they work with their husband or partner. And I was wondering,

Morag (51:18.826)
Mm-hmm.

Morag (51:30.914)
Mm-hmm.

Tim Parkin (51:32.452)
how you negotiate that space in terms of if you're interacting with women's groups or do you get seen sometimes as, it's Ted and then Morag does some stuff as well.

Morag (51:45.792)
Yeah, it's an interesting one that probably, probably that did used to happen, I would think, but because we've diverged a little bit. So even when we're collaborating, we're maybe doing different things. It's not so much of an issue now. And I mean, there are some incredible women's groups out there. You know, just off the top of my head, I'm thinking of She Clicks, it's Angela Nicholson, if I get her name right. Yeah.

She's got a huge kind of following and a whole kind of bunch of, I don't know how many tens of thousands it is now, but it's a lot of women, isn't it? In the world, obviously, of intentional camera movement and abstract photography that I spend quite a lot of time in, we haven't touched on that yet, there's a lot of women in there. I would say women outnumber men.

Tim Parkin (52:35.888)
I would say I would agree, yeah.

Morag (52:37.454)
I'm to imagine, but maybe flipping your ratio on its head, possibly. Yeah, something around that maybe. And I don't know if that's something about differences in the male and female psyche, but I come across a lot of women who've had quite a hard time, even just being in a camera club or whatever, just putting work forward. I think landscape photography, I hope I'm not...

Tim Parkin (52:40.908)
Yeah, easily. Yeah.

Morag (53:05.718)
saying this out of turn. So please challenge me if you think this is unfair or wrong, but it has had this kind of quite disciplined, strict, everything must be like this and it must be like this. And if you haven't done it like this, it's not right. And there's, just been a real hierarchy to it all the time, hasn't there? Even in a small club, right up to the kind of national and international stage. And, and it's probably been harder for women to kind of break through in that, but in the same way that they have in

in all aspects of life because we don't have equality yet even now, even though we're very much closer to it than we were. And obviously we've got some incredible, well-known female photographers doing well now, which obviously helps along the way as well as having people like you who celebrate female photographers. So I don't know if I've really answered the question there.

Tim Parkin (54:02.126)
No, I'm intrigued in it because we've had conversations and Matt Payne's had conversations about representation of women in our competition. been very, it's been, a lot of people have called for 50-50 representation on the panels and we've done as good as we can, but it's difficult finding the people who have similar levels of representation. I think men are very good at showing off sometimes.

Morag (54:19.374)
Mm.

Tim Parkin (54:32.484)
have maybe perhaps have a little more desire to build a following in terms of commercializing their work. And now we've seen that in some of the people we've looked at for judges. Whereas women, there's a big generalization, it might have something to do with the intentional camera movement side of things, tend to be more experimental with the photography, tend to be more personal.

Morag (54:48.813)
Mmm.

Tim Parkin (55:02.872)
And that sometimes doesn't do very well in a competition or a social media feedback way.

Morag (55:07.668)
Yes.

Yeah, because there's not much room for experimental, is there? Unless you just hit on the magical thing, like for that particular shot and it works and it fits the brief of the competition. there's probably a confidence thing as well there, I think. And again, generalizing, but men have typically been taught that they are confident and should be confident. And that's the way to go through life. And women haven't necessarily always had that.

So it's probably a range of things. And again, you know, I do think it's improving and changing. And we are seeing leaps in photography from women who do come forward and do check the rule book out and experiment. know, Valda Bailey is an incredible example of somebody who came in and she's certainly not, what was the word you said? Like that really driven wants to, you know.

Tim Parkin (56:03.952)
It's like ego driven, yeah.

Morag (56:06.094)
She hasn't got a great big ego that she's servicing from when I've met her. She's focused on what she does, she's very quiet and very gentle and very humble and she managed to break through and she was featured in your magazine really early on wasn't she?

Tim Parkin (56:22.356)
I love the fact that nobody, I don't think there are any male photographers who have gotten anywhere close to doing similar levels of work either.

Morag (56:29.59)
And yeah, and she progresses it all the time as well, doesn't she? You know, she gets to a stage and she works with that and then you see something new come and it's exciting and interesting. I mean, there's obviously there's great male ICM photographers as well. I Andy Gray strikes me as one who another really nice guy. Sorry, what do you think, Joe? I think I've talked a lot more.

Joe Cornish (56:54.227)
I'm really worried because I have a feeling I might be overly controversial. I I personally have take the, I mean, I've always tried to, when we were at the gallery to promote the cause of female photographers, mainly because I believe women are more naturally gifted than men as photographers, if I'm honest. And I've always felt that for decades and I've never understood.

why, well, I understand better, Morag, as a result of what you said, and about confidence, because I think that is, know, men are probably encouraged to push themselves forward and to show off, as Tim put it. That's just part of the, part of the cultural differences. But I mean, if you look back through, you know, with the great, you know, looking back through the history of photography, for goodness sake, some of the most important photographers who've ever lived have been women.

Morag (57:52.675)
Mm.

Joe Cornish (57:53.549)
arguably the greatest living photographer today is a woman, Sally Mann or Annie Levervitz. mean, you could name as many. I think they've made much more difference to the world than virtually any male photographer I can think of. And so, you know, I find the whole thing bizarre if you're you're asking my opinion. I couldn't agree more about Valda whose work I think is absolutely astonishing. I remember writing an article

Morag (58:11.373)
Yeah.

Joe Cornish (58:23.411)
four on landscape about five or six years ago, just in contradiction to somebody had written in to say that, actually, I mustn't misquote them because it's not fair, but it was a provocative article that sent in to him. don't know if you remember it, about how landscape photography was dead or words to that effect. And that landscape photography was predominantly done by sad middle-aged men with beards. Sorry.

Tim Parkin (58:51.322)
You got the beat, man. Yeah.

Joe Cornish (58:52.435)
I have, that's terrible, there you go. And I wrote back what I felt I hope was a constructive riposte, quoting yourself amongst others, Anna Booth, think, and Valda, and Lizzie Shepard, and possibly Margaret Serer and others, you know, as examples of brilliant female photographers whose work, you know, was actually

Morag (58:53.43)
Enjoying.

Morag (59:12.206)
Hmm. Hmm.

Joe Cornish (59:21.159)
blazing a trail creatively speaking in terms of nature and landscape particularly and that it you know the idea that that it was a moribund activity which just struck me as being absurd anyway doesn't matter but i just

Tim Parkin (59:36.346)
Sandra Bartokker as well.

Morag (59:38.264)
Yeah.

Joe Cornish (59:38.833)
Yeah, of course. know, so we have I don't think we're differing on this. It's just that we all have different perspectives on it. And I just I just find the whole thing baffling. It is frustrating. It has been frustrating for Tim, I know, to get female talent to come forward to whether it's to judge or to appear more regularly. Even here in this format, it's you know, I think if we count the folk that we've spoken to so far, there's more men than women.

Morag (01:00:00.504)
Thank you.

Joe Cornish (01:00:07.309)
you know, be nice if we could get 50-50 but it's just harder to find people who are willing to be interviewed actually.

Tim Parkin (01:00:14.224)
It is interesting. can probably count the number of men who have said no on one thumb. And I can count the number of women who have said no to writing or interviews or talks on multiple hands. Yeah, because it's...

Morag (01:00:26.688)
On your feet. Yeah. I think there will be a big confidence thing in that, you know, and I know like today, I think it was really nice coming into this for me. It's the first time I've done something like this where I haven't been stressed or terrified. And it's not just because I know you two, it's because I really feel grounded in what I'm doing now. You know, I just feel like it's

I'm not doing it for any other reason than I'm curious and it means something to me and it feels important. And I get excited when I see the results. And somehow that's turned me around from feeling very nervous and feeling like I don't know what I'm talking about or I don't know enough about what I'm talking about or will people say, she's stupid, what's she going on about? You know, that would have had me in terror for like the full two weeks running up to this.

Tim Parkin (01:01:16.645)
Yeah.

Morag (01:01:17.166)
You know, it's only quite recently, even though I'm however many years into this, that that switch has come, I think.

Tim Parkin (01:01:24.784)
Strange isn't it? that imposter syndrome I think is a big thing. Yeah, definitely. Yeah.

Morag (01:01:26.848)
Yeah.

Joe Cornish (01:01:28.805)
I mean, if it's any consolation, I'd say that if you feel like you're an imposter, that humility is one of your superpowers, because I do think that it's an important quality to have. It means that you're constantly questioning what you do and that you have the kind of groundedness to understand that, you know, we never know everything. We can't. That's not what it's about. It's simply if you...

Morag (01:01:35.64)
you

Joe Cornish (01:01:54.131)
If you're able to truly be yourself as an artist, however long you've been doing it, then you've probably got something worth saying, I think.

Morag (01:02:01.078)
Yeah, and I mean, just what you've talked about there would be such a good thing to have a whole article about and, you know, and hopefully this conversation will help people. I mean, I heard, I'm probably going to pronounce his name wrong, even though he's so famous, Sebastian Salgado talk at Birmingham, probably, I want to say a few years ago, it's probably 10.

And he just said that, you know, people are always looking at this end result and how do I be unique and how do I make my niche? And he's saying, you know, just understand that the thing that's unique is you and your history and everything that came before you right back to your ancestors and you in that place in that time taking the photo is the unique thing. You know, it's not like trying to magically find a niche that someone else has already done.

Um, you know, and I, cause I do a lot of mentoring and coaching and that's, I think that's just such an important thing that people feel valued and valid. And like you said, Joe, that it's almost guaranteed they've got something interesting to say.

Tim Parkin (01:02:59.056)
It is.

Joe Cornish (01:03:07.123)
That's so true. mean, I think just so I can see times drawing on, I just a couple more things I just wanted to run by in terms of Morag's work, because I think if anybody goes, I mean, you're saying that your website needs a bit of updating. But even if you go onto it now, that's the one that you share with Ted. You get insights into what you both do. But your core concerns still emerge from

Morag (01:03:26.872)
Mm-hmm.

Joe Cornish (01:03:36.327)
this deep passion for nature and an ability to sort of not see the world just through the lens of the camera, but to be able to go out and experience it with your ears and your body, your hands and your whole being. And I think that, if you're living the life of an artist, that's really, really important to remember, even if in the end you use a camera to record a picture or translate it. And I just found that the number of different projects and

Morag (01:04:00.302)
Mm.

Joe Cornish (01:04:06.355)
and ideas that you have. Well, first of all, I thought it was quite overwhelming. don't know if you can manage so many things at once, but that's who you are. And I think it's a good example of be driven by the things that you love the most. And then it really doesn't matter whether you feel you're an imposter or not, because you'll still go ahead and do it anyway.

Morag (01:04:22.414)
and

Morag (01:04:28.598)
Yeah, no thank you Jo. I think you're right, it does come together because you are just, yeah, your being, the thing that moves and motivates you every day as opposed to wondering what you should be or having any concern about what someone else will think about that when you show it to them six months down the line. You just crack on and do it and kind of see what happens.

Tim Parkin (01:04:50.872)
Yeah, I love that idea of being passionate about something changes the way you see it. think it's a, and that is is style at the end of the day. It's what you choose, what you love.

Joe Cornish (01:04:50.995)
Exactly.

Morag (01:04:59.99)
Yeah, yeah. And the big word for me over the last year or two, and it's even what the one of the Forrester project is caught is curious conversations. And I think that curiosity, if you can keep that and nurture it and celebrate it and enjoy it, I think that's a long way. So it's kind of like keeping fresh and keeping enthused and motivated.

Tim Parkin (01:05:24.632)
I

Joe Cornish (01:05:24.787)
It's curious, isn't it, that we get to this age that I am now, like just got my pension. And what you're actually trying to do is go back to being a child again. it really is that, as you say, curiosity is the word that we use now. But it's the same thing. It's a sense of wonder and excitement and feeling that everything that you see is interesting because it is.

Morag (01:05:34.498)
Mm-hmm.

Morag (01:05:49.518)
Yeah, absolutely. And celebrating that rather than, you know, because I think some people can put childlike or childish into a negative space the same way they can naivety or vulnerability. Ted, we're just and I were just talking about that this morning. Whereas all of those things are really, really important. And they're important to carry with you and keep with you. They're kind of gifts, aren't they, as opposed to, you know, burdens or something that should be diminished.

Joe Cornish (01:06:10.727)
Day on.

Tim Parkin (01:06:13.2)
Well, thank you very much Morag and Joe again for a great hour session. We'll put links to your website on which should have been updated by this time, this go live, I believe. So thank you very much and we'll see everybody again from the next podcast in a month's time.

Joe Cornish (01:06:25.255)
I'm sorry.

Morag (01:06:25.76)
Promise.

Morag (01:06:30.755)
Thanks.

Joe Cornish (01:06:34.791)
Thanks, Moran.

Morag (01:06:34.904)
Thank you very much for having me. Lovely to see you both.

Tim Parkin (01:06:41.616)
just want to end it.