What next for me?
Well, the MA is over, and I got a Merit for my labours! There were times last year where I thought I didn’t even have the smarts to make it through an MA at all, so this is definitely cause for celebration.
So now it falls to me to ask the scary question — what’s next? For me, for my life, my research? Entering into this MA I didn’t necessarily think of myself as a ‘researcher practitioner’, and it would be very easy to fall back into a life where research doesn’t play a huge role in my practice.
Most of my professional work will probably remain unchanged from where it was at pre-MA. As a freelance designer with a relatively well established base of clients, I do a lot of creative artworking… I also design logos and brand worlds, which certainly require a degree of research, as does my illustration work, sometimes. But not the kind of scholarly, methodical, methodological research that I have started dabbling in on MAGMD.
It’s fair to say there was something of a void in my practice before I started this MA, and there will probably continue to be something of a void if I simply stop thinking in these ways and considering ideas more deeply. So now it befalls me to find ways of taking this work forward, without the structures and framework of an academic qualification to push me forward. (Because goodness knows, I’m not doing a PhD any time soon).
What next for my area of research?
When we were defining our major project area, our tutors were at pains to emphasise how much we must care about and be invested in our area of study. ‘If you’re going to think about this thing for six months straight and produce good work about it, it needs to be something that compels you’.
Well, I picked the thing that I’ve wanted an excuse to think about in more depth for years, and I’m pleased to say that I have reached the end of this process still fascinated by it, and crucially, with the feeling that there is so much more to explore.
It took me much of the last decade to come to peace with my identity as a train nerd, not least because I didn’t feel I fitted in with the Francis Bourgeois’ and Fred Dibnahs’ of this world. Mechanics and models of train don’t hold loads of interest for me, beyond the functionality they serve to humans in transit (so I am interested in, for example, the different layouts of the interiors of different kinds of train).
What I care about, and what has fascinated me all these years is what trains mean, what they stand for. Their nature as an inherently communal space, a way in which individual needs and desires intersect in shared purpose. What is the experience of train travel? How does that experience differ from person to person? How do our individual ideas and experiences of train travel build into a collective mood and vision that shapes what we want and what we expect from our transit networks?
When I think about the future of this country, and the world, there are ever so many vital, pressing areas which seem to need thought and passion and change. Another thing I wrestled with for a long time was that my area of interest wasn’t important enough. Why am I over here fucking about making posters about trains when the oceans are rising? But everything is a piece in the puzzle, and it is my firm belief that the expansion of public transport provision and use globally is a vital piece in this puzzle — a puzzle which we absolutely must solve.
So then I ask myself — what difference can I make? I’m not a policy maker — if I was, I’d be reversing as many of the Beeching cuts as possible, building other new lines, massively investing in high speed rail and in developing and improving the network and rolling stock we already have, and ultimately striving to make public transport free for all. But this is beyond my will, and probably beyond the will of anyone in this country right now.
So instead, as a graphic design researcher-practitioner, I ask myself how I can use my skills to explore what rail travel looks like right now, what it means, and to advocate for, and ask questions about, its future growth and improvement, as well as sowing the seed in the minds of others about its importance.
What next for my MA project?
Of course, I have already made a big start on this work with my MA project, LDN – BTN, which takes an in-depth exploration of a whole range of facets of the London to Brighton railway line as a starting point for asking wider questions about the future of railway travel in the UK (and beyond). The work that I have produced so far could be considered ‘Phase 1’ of the project.
This ‘Phase 1’ has involved a degree of collaboration — with my 12+ walking companions/contributors, as well as a number of other people who have advised and supported me in my work. But for this project to develop further and take on wider significance, I need to figure out where to take it next. What is ‘phase 2’? There are a few avenues I want to pursue.
1) Distributing physical copies
I have a total of 30 full copies of the project. It was expensive and a labour of love to produce, as documented, so this is likely all there will ever be. Approximately 18 of them have homes with my contributors and others who have supported me in my work, but I want the remaining 12 to live in collections or spaces where they will be accessible to as many people as possible, and also archived for posterity. (There’s a little vanity in this of course, but it also seems like a natural conclusion to ‘Phase 1’ to make the project as it currently stands more widely accessible in its physical form)
2) Seeking wider contributions
My original vision for the project was to seek out much wider contributions from people beyond my immediate circles, but COVID and timeframes made this impossible. However I still feel like it is an important part of the project to strive to get this wider participation, so the key part of ‘phase 2’ is to try and find ways of meaningfully seeking this out. There are many groups of people who I would be interested in engaging, including train staff, children and young people who travel by train, commuters, leisure travellers and more.
I am interested in the idea of running workshops in a variety of different settings, using the tickets I have already created as a provocation. What stories can be told by other people using these tickets as prompts? How can I use what I have learnt about speculative futures practices to draw out their best ideas? For the tickets where I have considered questions and drawn my own ideas, how might others answer these questions in their own way? Could the tickets be ‘gamified’ in some way to offer a different kind of provocation/working method for workshop participants? In my work I created a small set of 12 train tickets for each walk, contained within a ticket wallet. I like the idea of offering up this format to participants as a space to explore their own ideas about the route, and train travel more generally.
3) Seek out external support/interest
None of the above is likely to be very successful without the support of some external parties. There are a number of organisations who I would like to approach with my project as it currently stands to discuss how we might be able to collaborate to take it further. These include:
Southern Rail/Thameslink — Could I get permission to spend time in their stations conducting this one-to-one/group research when COVID pressures are less intense? Could I even run, for example, a short residency in a station? Some smaller stations have old waiting rooms and other station buildings that are sometimes given over to art projects — what could be more fitting than using those spaces to welcome train passengers and invite them to contribute to this project?
London Transport Museum — My project has a massive overlap with the kind of work the LTM does in fostering an appreciation and respect for the railway network. What guidance, support, and at a stretch, space, could they offer me in pursuing this more participatory approach to my research?
4) Document these contributions meaningfully
If I am successful in running workshops and/or in seeking out further contributions in other ways, what do these ideas become? How are they shared? How do they feed back to places and people who would benefit from seeing them? Engaging external partners will also be a key part of this process, in figuring out how this research can do the most possible.
What next for other projects?
LDN – BTN is likely to occupy my attention for some time to come then, but it was always created with other ideas for taking this research further in different settings.
‘Up North’
In the UK, the railway network is notorious for having something of a North-South divide. While commuters in the south complain about over-crowded carriages and delays, somehow the voices of commuters in the north, who suffer from — often — even worse over crowding, older trains, and worse delays, are rarely heard south of Manchester. As part of the UK’s fight to combat climate change, it is vital that investment be made in railway networks across the country. It is also vital that more rural areas be equally considered in this investment. I don’t yet have a well formed idea of what this study would look like, but I am interested in taking similar research methodologies to those used in LDN – BTN, to explore perceptions of the North-South divide in railway travel, rural experiences of rail connectivity (both into cities and surrounding rural areas), and how rail travel as a whole is understood in areas towards the north of the country, both by those who do and do not use it.
Eurostar
Another project I proposed in the early stages of my MA planning was a study of the Eurostar network. Eurostar, at the time I was beginning my project, sat at a strange precipice — the combination of Brexit and COVID had left it precarious and vulnerable, and there were, for a time, questions about whether a passenger rail connection between the UK and mainland Europe might lapse. Its future now seems more secure, but there are still a lot of interesting questions to be asked about rail travel between the UK and EU. I have long been fascinated by how sense of place manifests itself in the liminal spaces we pass through during transit…. High speed international rail should offer a vital alternative to air travel, but many people do not consider it as an option. Why is this? Could fostering more of a sense of place, history, and excitement about the very physical process of moving across large landmasses at speed, at ground level, contribute to increased affection for, and uptake of this mode of transport? Do Europeans need as much convincing of this as British people? Through an in-depth study of Eurostar termini and stations in London, Paris, Brussels, Lille and Amsterdam, what could we learn about the spaces that have been created, the meaning they carry for those who pass through them, and what this means for uptake of long-distance, high-speed rail into Europe?
The USA
I have long been fascinated with rail travel in the US, and there are a whole variety of areas I would be fascinated to turn my attentions to. Long-distance rail travel in the US is an incredible and often under-used resource, with many Americans never even having travelled by train. Amtrak also have a history of supporting artists in residence and art projects about and across their network, which makes this feel like fertile ground for study.
Los Angeles is a city very close to my heart, and before travelling there, I was widely informed that I wouldn’t get anywhere without a car. In practice, this isn’t entirely true. While offering sparse coverage, there is a metro network which connects many key areas of the city. However, many native Angelenos have never even set foot on it (find a Londoner who’s never ridden the underground!) — it is perceived as slow and dangerous. Where does the network pass through, who uses it and why, and how might it be seen and understood differently?
New York is perhaps one of the US cities best served for public transit, and yet getting from the main airport to the heart of Manhattan via public transport is a lesson in confusion and strife. Here, as in LA, I am interested particularly in the approach I adopted in LDN – BTN, of exploring a route both on foot and by train, to come to a richer and deeper understanding of the people and the spaces created by the network, and how they might be better appreciated and supported.
Japan
Japan is widely known for having some of the best and most reliable trains in the world. Perhaps best known are its Shinkansen (Bullet) trains, but beyond this there is a vast network of smaller branch trains, many with incredibly idiosyncratic designs and concepts, purpose made to lure in tourists. While there are a number of unique and unusual trains dotted across the world, nowhere is there such a proliferation of these ‘concept’ trains as in Japan. By exploring a number of these branch routes, both from the train and the stations, what can we learn about the ways trains are perceived and valued in Japan, and is there any way of introducing this ‘culture’ in the UK?
What next for this blog
What next is I stop writing, and thank you for reading this far. If you have any thoughts or ideas about any of this, please drop me a line, as I’m keen to discuss my next steps with some fresh ears. I will write some more when I’ve started making a bit more progress!
em—dash 