The Corn Bunting is a bird which has been extinct in Ireland since the later half of the 1990’s. Prior to this there had been a 86% reduction in population since 1967 in Ireland & the U.K.  this was mainly due to changes in agricultural farming and fewer seed and insect sources being available to the bird on farmland  which formed its main source of food. Also because the corn bunting was a late nesting species & their nests can be destroyed during harvesting & in cutting periods as their nests are located in low areas of grassland and hedgerows. 

This series of photographic images exists somewhere between the real and the imaginary acting as a travelogue, the birds thoughts, memories, on Lough Foyle as it is leaving and flying  east emigrating to Scotland where the bird was and still is present.

And in conclusion the series asks is it possible for the Corn Bunting to be reintroduced back into Ireland in Lough Foyle & Co.Donegal as it was in Western Scotland With the help of surrounding communities.  

Liam Campbell is a Visual Artist based in Northern Ireland, he is originally from Co.Down and grew up in Galway and moved to Dublin to study photography and Fine Art at Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art Design & Technology in 2001 – 05 graduating with a BA in Fine Art before going on to complete his Masters in Art in the Contemporary World at the National College of Art & Design 2006 – 07. He has been interested in alternative ways of living which revolve around food and has seen food as acting as a social tool in bringing people together which otherwise would not have met. Working abroad on cultural exchange programmes has inspired this with organisations such as Concordia in Norway and also Project 67 in Israel on Kibbutz when he was younger.  He has exhibited & been published on a regular basis in Ireland & the U.K. since 2002 and taught a number of photographic workshops based around a Sense of place in both film based photography and digital also. His work is in both public and private collections.