Seeing with light and landscape: a walk around Stanton Moor

Abstract

This paper focuses on the much-neglected contribution of light to the conceptualisation of landscape. I discuss how light circulates through our visual system and around the spaces we see, refuting notions that we can be detached from the landscapes that we view and characterise. Though we see with the vital light and the landscape, I emphasise that our experiences are invariably entangled with prevalent cultural values, meanings and representations. By drawing upon the experience of walking around an area of raised moorland in the Peak District, I suggest that the experience of particular landscapes can be distinguished by the changing light that radiates upon them and to which we continuously become attuned. By composing an autoethnographic account that highlights key moments when its effects seemed particularly acute, I exemplify the distinctive ways in which the shifting light interacts with elements within this particular landscape.

Keywords:

• Light
• landscape
• vitalism
• perception
• sensation

Acknowledgements

Big thanks to Mikkel Bille and Julian Holloway for comments on this paper as well as the anonymous referees and the journal editor. Also enormous appreciation for Uma Kothari in accompanying me on this journey.