Ghosts & Empties

Ghosts and Empties is part of a continuing series of films titled Zones of Change, exploring themes surrounding the disjointed development of the Thames Gateway region. Using sound, and moving image to act as a portal to read and experience the landscape, this film explores the Gateway region at night.
At night the edgelands come alive. The drab grey exteriors of warehouses become bathed in light, sodium, fluorescent and LEDs, in a shifting hue of yellows, reds, ochre’s, greens and blues. Arterial roads are given over to tankers and ‘artics’, ferrying goods and fuel from giant out of town distribution centres. Boy racers in souped up hatch backs tear apart the still air, bass carrying for miles, engines screaming for respite, wheels screeching for purchase on the damp asphalt. Nightclub patrons are ejected onto the street, bleary eyed and wrestling with gravity, Cigarettes are lit, drinks regurgitated, vivid colours splash. Sirens pierce the void. ‘The scale of expansion of the ‘night