About Jethro Adlington
Artist Statement
About Jethro Adlington.
Born: Nottingham.
Early life: St Annes and then moved up to a council house in Sherwood.
School: High Pavement Grammar School, where I requested my educational options as biology, chemistry and art. My teacher said that art wasn’t appropriate and that I should do physics.
Jobs: Dental technician, played guitar in a couple of bands, microbiologist, environmental consultant and finally as a psychotherapist.
My artwork:
In 2018, I went to the site of a Roman villa in Chedworth. It was quite a hill trek to get to the villa and that, combined with the walk around the site under a blaring sun, left me hot and fatigued.
I sat outside to take a drink of water. When I looked down I saw, half hidden in the soil, what looked like the remains of an old mobile phone.
I pulled it out of the soil; it was a smashed up iPod.
I thought about how this piece of modern technology, almost lost in the grass and soil, might end up as a treasured “relic” in the years to come.
This led me to the creation of my own “relic” prints, constructed in part from discarded electronic pieces: outdated mobile phones, radios, computer keyboards etc. I then added more found waste to highlight the hidden nature of the electronic items.
The prints encompass the theme of waste as art, as well as highlighting the fact that so much electronic waste goes back to the ground; back to where it came. This also gave rise to my thoughts on mortality; we inevitably go back to ground and become relics.
The Latin titles are a “nod” to my original visit to the Roman villa at Chedworth.
Each piece is unique, with no two the prints same.They are prints, but are as original as an oil painting.
Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
Rene Belloq, to Indiana Jones.
“Look at this watch, it’s worthless, it cost about 10 dollars from a vendor in the street.
But if I take it, bury it in the sand for 1000 years, it becomes priceless.”