Quarrying has been and is one of the largest and most notable industries in the areas that surround Buxton, an idyllic spa town in Derbyshire, UK. This industrialised process has been key to the local economy for many generations, providing work to the residents of Buxton and the raw materials to construct much of the buildings and infrastructure within the town to date.
As the supply of extracted minerals are exhausted from one quarry, the industrial works will close and the crater will often be left to flood with water. At one of the disused sites: Harpur Hill Quarry, the abandoned chemical compounds is absorbed by the collected water to form a toxic blue pool of alkaline-rich water. Despite the health implications, the nicknamed ‘Blue Lagoon’ is host to many visitors every year who are allured by the deep blue colour, swimming in its toxic and littered waters, often suffering from chemical burns and fungal infections; arguably an indelible legacy of the industry which scars a landscape.
Repository Materials 1 - 2019 - Photograph mounted on MDF 0.4m x 0.3m
Repository Materials 2 - 2019 - Photograph mounted on MDF 0.4m x 0.3m
Repository Materials 3 - 2019 - Photograph mounted on MDF 0.4m x 0.3m
Repository Materials 4 - 2019 - Photograph mounted on MDF 0.4m x 0.3m
Repository Materials 5 - 2019 - Photograph mounted on MDF 0.4m x 0.3m
Repository Materials 6 - 2019 - Photograph mounted on MDF 0.4m x 0.3m