The Way of the Cross | Photographs by Stephen Deazley

The Way of the Cross charts graffitied crosses in Scottish cities. Marked in ink, chalk, pencil and nail polish, scratched into wood and stone or drawn with a finger into the grime of a telephone box window, they can be found at the thresholds to tenement flats, on the side of bins, or positioned with a graphic and sometimes comic eye, riding upon graffiti tags or in direct conversation with the peeling fabric of the city’s walls.

It borrows its title from Via Dolorosa, The Way of Sorrow, an ancient devotional route in Jerusalem’s Old City that rises in the Muslim quarter and ends at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and which is believed to mark moments in the passion and crucifixion of Jesus: where he was condemned to death; took up the cross; consoled his weeping mother; and is eventually stripped and nailed to the cross. It is a profound story of sacrifice and ritualised public humiliation, kindness and cruelty, vulnerability and strength, fear and acceptance.

Photographer, Stephen Deazley grew up in a Belfast Catholic household in a culture rich with icons and biblical imagery, and while he is not, these days, religious in any way, he finds these crosses and the mark making very moving, akin more to private meditations than public declarations of faith. They speak to him of loneliness and affirmation in equal measure and reveal part of a city’s untold story. Collecting them has become a meditation, a ritual of walking, noticing, and bearing witness to those who made them and to the moments in time when they were made.

“You ignore graffiti at your peril. It’s the heartbeat of a city. It’s the voice of the voiceless.”

Terry Pratchett

Stephen Deazley is perhaps better known across Scotland as a choir director, music educator and composer, whose work enables communities and people of all ages to participate in inspirational music making. This is his first public exhibition.

10% of profits on sales will be donated to Simon Community Scotland, providing safe places and support for people experiencing, or at risk of homelessness.