'A work of art as much as literature'

Photographer Elin Gruffydd's breathtaking new book weaves a timeless story in works and photographs, writes Jenny White

- Jenny White

FROM the sun casting light on water to a wave crashing like an angel’s wing, the photographs in Elin Gruffydd’s new book Sweet Melancholy seem to exist in an eternal place, out of time.

Taken using a film camera on the Greek island of Hydra and Ynys Enlli in Wales, the pictures are set beside lines from the writings of Brenda Chamberlain (1912-71). Born in Bangor, Chamberlain spent time on Ynys Enlli and later lived on the island of Hydra.

Echoing her movements, Gruffydd lived and worked on Ynys Enlli and spent time on Hydra while working on her master’s degree in Greek mythology.

Her dissertation explores how women in Greek and Roman mythology use creativity and art as a form of resistance in chaotic times.

"The Muses, Penelope and a lot of different characters use art as a way of telling their story, and I was hoping to find a way to relate that to the modern world," she says.

Chamberlain’s work and life on two different islands provided the means, Trained at the Royal Academy Schools in 1931, Chamberlain is better known for her paintings, but published some significant works of poetry and prose, among them Tide-Race, an evocation of life on Ynys Enlli, and A Rope of Vines, her journal from Hydra.

Gruffydd’s book uses excerpts from these two titles to create a new work of extraordinary depth and beauty.