The Water's Edge

Water: an essential element that sustains our world and a powerful metaphor that has been used by artists and writers as a way of expressing emotion for centuries.Fusing images and poems that share water as a common theme, The Water's Edge explores the complexities of expression through a series of screenprints by the acclaimed artist Ardyn Halter. Beautiful imagery is complemented by a range of poems that, while quite separate from the prints, are linked by the notion of water as a primary element in the emotional consciousness of the creative being. Indeed, though none of the prints were produced to illustrate the poems, the words and images sit together effortlessly.Including the work of an impressive roll-call of modern-day poets - Seamus Heaney, Geoffrey Hill, Paul Muldoon and Don Paterson feature, amongst others - The Water's Edge also reproduces original hand-written drafts of selected poems, and correspondence between artist and writer regarding specific pieces as well as the elements that went into the making of individual prints: elements tried, used, altered or discarded. This is the creative mind at work. The result is not only a beautiful homage to a life-sustaining element but a fascinating insight into the complexities of artistic expression and how artists and writers translate emotional impulses into finished works.