The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work contains over a hundred original images specially commissioned from the great documentary photographer Richard Baker. Following are some of the images that didn’t make it into the book.

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Cargo Ship Spotting
Photo slideshow

Every day of the year, in ports all over the world, vast cargo ships sail in, unnoticed by almost all of us who rely on their merchandise. However, at the perimeter of harbours, you’ll often find a curious group of people standing around in waterproof clothing, armed with binoculars and pads. These cargo ship spotters keep a meticulous track of the activity on the water. They are interested in the ships’ length, provenance, engines and ownership. Society tells us that there is nothing wrong spending time in art galleries admiring seascapes – and yet cargo ship spotting has a bad name in many quarters. It’s seen as obsessive and strange. The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work celebrates the curiosity and eccentricity of the world’s ship spotters and suggests that these people have a lesson to teach us all about the value of observing bits of the economy in ways that are not simply financial and numerical: in other words, in looking at them a little as we might a work of art.