Marc Provins

My New Year's resolution this January was to see more of my mum and dad, which I'm managing to do pretty successfully. Somehow in 2013 I only got to Gloucestershire twice, which really shocked me when I realised, let's face it none of us are getting any younger. So I've just had a very lovely couple of days in their company and breathing in some good country air.  I always end up feeling a bit nostalgic visiting that neck of the woods as I grew up there but left in a dash at 19. So today flying along the A40 in my little car with my camera on the passenger seat and Depeche Mode on the stereo, I suddenly had a flashback to doing exactly the same thing about thirty years ago. This time however I wasn't sporting dyed, crimped hair and guyliner and my car seemed a bit quieter than my battered Escort Mark 1. When things become familiar, it's easy to take them for granted and this picture is about that process in a way. The sofa in the picture belongs to

I've always liked a bit of blur. It seems uniquely photographic as choosing what to focus on is an essential part of the process of making a photograph. The camera also has the ability to record a type of blur that we couldn't normally witness; motion blur, as we can't do long exposures with our human eyes (yet). I've been running quite a lot recently and I rarely wear my glasses or my contact lenses. This may sound contrary, even dangerous but I run off road around Chorlton Ees, which feels like countryside and means I'm not competing with cars, buses and pedestrians for space. I've realised I actually enjoy how the world looks in this situation, blocks of colour, interesting loosely defined shapes, everything slightly soft, a bit less real and harsh.  These thoughts came back to me this weekend whilst I was sat in the back of a car being driven through The Lake District. We went through many weather systems from bright sunshine to torrential down