Experiences of Remoteness: How to [re] experience Intimacy

 

To experience remoteness could be considered a contemporary luxury, to experience remote intimacy would be something only a select number of human beings could understand. With a world predominately entangled in economic, political and socio chaos, it can be difficult to find an environment that allows oneself escapism. If one was to search outside the clutter of human chaos, what formations of the natural environment would be found and experienced? Why should the human re-encounter the natural environment and how does one acknowledge a remotely intimate experience?

​

​Driven by notions of the romantic sublime, Ritchard explores the aesthetics of the natural landscape that heighten the senses and allow for an encounter that is intimately compelled by natural phenomenon. Taking himself to remote locations within the UK (North Yorkshire Moors, Galloway Forest, Eskdale Muir Forest et al), and with an act of chosen solitude, along with the method of walking, he finds a rhythm that allows him to think-through the relationship between the human and the environment and reconnect multiple times often via the artistic approaches captured.