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Gordon Craig's four series Building blocks, Proliferate, Commune and Age/ing form part of the larger body of work Cycles of Life.

The titles of his exhibition imply abundance, but the images from China cause us to reflect what our valuing of growth can mean. The photographs contrast the hope of plenty with the reality of its impact. Building blocks has echoes of our own childhood, juxtaposing words and images of progress and growth. Empty rooms inspire anticipation and hope. The absence of occupants encourages the viewer to imagine a future, to populate the space. Craig reminds us of China’s One Child Policy and its legacy in a nation which struggles to control the effects of its own progress. Proliferate is a series of photographs of trees and flowers carefully planted in preparation for the Beijing Olympics. We see an attempt to control nature, to plant into blocks, as we organise people. There is a kind of defiance in the non-conformity of the trees, the spreading weeds along the carefully tilled channel. The humans who imposed the order of the rows, the selection of the monoculture are invisible, their labours gradually being overcome by the abundance of nature.