Dark Utopia

Based loosely on a real-life experience - if you can call it that - last Saturday night. On the way to Cardiff to go to the monthly goth/alternative music night, 'Inquisition', we drove down a quiet stretch of motorway. There were dark hills on one side of the road, and the industry sprawling out from Port Talbot created an ominous silhouette on the other. Fire roared up from the tall chimneys into the night, amidst thick plumes of smoke that drifted across the brown skies above.

I looked out at those surroundings through the small, fogged-up windows of our early 1970's Volkswagen. It all felt so surreal with the four of us dressed in various combinations of lace, leather, pvc, studded collars, heavy black coats and gloves; it was as though we had suddenly been thrust into some apocalyptic near future. For a moment we were on a completely different world and, despite the visually hostile landscape, everything seemed right; it was calming in a way that I can't explain with words, a stark, concrete sanctuary.

Inspired by what I saw on the journey, I created the picture above - an imposing, foreboding escape for the imagination: my Dark Utopia.

© Rich Morgan. Thanks as usual to my girlfriend Fuchsia for feedback throughout the piece.