My frictionless fly

Watching videos of fly tying, I’m aware of how tight the feathers and string are tied around the hook. The fly tyer never lets the twine relax, always maintaining tension […]

Shank, gape and barb

In the catalogue this Dry Fly Supreme hook is described as having a “standard shank, round bend, wide gape, and a down-eye, all of which makes it “the ideal all […]

Hat on a hat

This will be the first commission in which I use music. I have always steered clear of it in the past: partly because, I think, it can so easily take […]

Aerial calligraphy

Not strictly to do with the Test, Mottisfont or F.M Halford, but I came across this in my research. I have always thought of casting – the whisking, flipping and […]

The idea of Otter

I’ve been looking into the River Test (quite literally), well stocked with trout, thinking about how it will be impacted by climate change. I then went up to the cafe […]

The Novice

A virtual dry-fly for a virtual trout. I have been experimenting in VR using Tiltbrush to tie my first fly, or at least my impression of a fly. Then I […]

Virtual Test

Imagine one of the pillars in the cellurium at Mottisfont, with the vaulted ceiling emanating from the top; then imagine the room flooded with water from the Test, the surface […]

In search of Detached Badger

For those of you not familiar with the history of dry-fly fishing (me included until quite recently), or the provenance of the Oakley Beat at Mottisfont, the key figure in […]

Surface lexicon

This laser scan of the sea surface off the Isle of Portland came to mind as Neil, the river keeper, was pointing out how the ripples and swellings on the […]

Back to where I started

Just as fish caught in the river would have been brought to the house and stored in the cellar, so it is with my work from this residency. It will […]

First sighting

I was on the Rectory Beat today and saw my first fish. It might not look much to you, but it pleased me! Trout or salmon? Not sure. But happy […]

Surface Tensions goes live!

Fresh into 2019 and this project is finally off the ground! I will be in residence on the Oakley Beat at Mottisfont this year, working towards an exhibition in Spring […]

Breast milk to RAW

It keeps coming up, in the books I am reading (The Patterning Instinct by Jeremy Lent), the films I am watching (Arrival by Denis Villeneuve (dir), above), the same theme in […]

Away with the birds

A bird just flew in the window. By 1985 I was a PhD student in the Zoology Department of Edinburgh University, studying a small corner of animal behaviour: how games […]

Paradise by way of Kensal Green

For a time I shared a flat with the Japanese illustrator, Satoshi Kitamura, above an abandoned shop at the top end of Ladbroke Grove, just across the Regents Canal from […]

Light out of darkness

Once upon a time, at the centre of our world there was a sun, surrounded by the chill-darkness of space, and from that sun we received light, and the scientists […]