ACCORDING to Manchester Mega-Photo artist Aidan O’Rourke, the stunning image is the largest ever taken of the city.
Measuring around 8.3 metres by 3 metres or 27 feet by 10 feet, the image is certainly impressive in terms of its scale.
But it is the minute detail and passion for Manchester that has gone into the photo collage that gives it real strength.
As a former ex-pat, who lived in the Gulf for five years, Aidan was able to bring genuine passion into his work.
And while the similarity between the huge cityscape, on display at Urbis, and the Polaroid collages of David Hockney is striking, its creator says that 1982 sci-fi movie Blade inspired his obsession for detailed cityscapes.
“There was this character that could zoom in and into a photograph until it homed in on something tiny like a serial number,” said Aidan. “That really captured my imagination.”
It was through this film that Aidan began to document cityscapes across four or five overlapping photographs.
The invitation to the top of Beetham Tower – which Aidan describes as “scary” but “fantastic” – enabled him to take his photographic ambitions much further, dedicating hours and years of work to the cause.
And it hasn’t finished there. Aidan has more ambitious projects afoot, which you can learn more of on www.aidan.co.uk

This entry was posted on Monday, July 7th, 2008 at 1:57 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.