At The Water's Edge

The National Maritime Museum brings together four photographers who know britain’s piers, pebbles, and promenades intimately. Tracy Calder finds out more

- Tracy Calder

The first glimpse of the sea is always a thrill. Released from the car, often hot and sticky after a long drive, you make your way through the dunes, grass whipping at your legs, salt fizzing on your tongue. The sand is warm beneath your feet, but carrying the obligatory cool box and windbreak makes progress slow. Ascending the final dune, your heart quickens as you anticipate the view. One more step and you are at the top, marveling at the shimmering water stretching out below you. Propelled by some primitive urge you drop your belongings and race towards the water. The first wave hits your legs and you flinch at its icy touch, but when the second wave arrives you find yourself remarking, ‘It’s not as cold as I thought it was going to be.’ In reality, there is no way you are going in without a full wetsuit. Suitably refreshed you return to the windbreak and begin setting up camp.

A day at the seaside is a delicious mixture of childish excitement, rituals and nostalgia. ‘It’s a unique landscape – somewhere you can escape the rigours of everyday life,’ says Kristian Martin, curator at the National Maritime Museum in London. ‘It’s somewhere you feel free and uninhibited, but it’s somewhere democratic too. At the seaside you cast off the shackles of everyday life and behave in a way that you wouldn’t normally.’ On the beach you shed half of your clothes, volunteer to be buried in the sand, and dig a hole with a plastic spade to see how far it is to the earth’s core – quite frankly, it’s not normal.