On Homes of Football June 7, 2006
Sixteen years ago I dreamt up “The Homes of Football” as a photographic / artistic / people-watching / football-watching labour of love… and expected to take years to put it together. I am not sure it will ever be finished. I recently made a concerted attempt to make it truly GLOBAL, visiting countries worldwide to extend its appeal and audience and scope. My understanding of the World had previously been with the occasional foray abroad, for football World Cups. Now my own personal world cup is a never-ending world cup , whilst the real World Cup, repeating every four years, is really the icing on the cake.
For whatever reasons and concerns, cometh 2006, I have decided to change my direction and look to The World. This new website “Football, Photography & The World” aims to show off my new direction. (Designed by Phil Powell). If it was borne of The Homes of Football, was the son of it and will now become parent to it (England’s Wordsworth said “The child is the father of the man”).
Those of you that have come to like The Homes of Football and follow its progress (I Thank You), will know something of its path so far. For those that don’t excuse me a paragraph or more to explain it…
The Homes of Football , as devised by me, set out to show that football was special in the land where I grew up : in England and in its near neighbours Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland. That it had possibly ALWAYS been special and currently was extra-special but undergoing a radical change. Being something of a story-teller, mostly in imagery, I wanted to tell a story about what it meant to me and probably many people like me or around me. I wanted to honour the ‘fact’ that my England and my Scotland particularly were responsible for giving such a fantastic ‘game’ to the World by exporting it through sailors, through trips abroad. And I wanted to show that the game was in these countries of its birth, still as brilliant as anywhere.
… And if it turned out it wasn’t then I could play my part in MAKING IT LOOK as if it was as good as anywhere. So there was and is a sense of competition about me and what I am doing : I am quite happy for others to play with the ball, have a great time, experience the best there is, as long as we do too and as long as we remain respected.
