At a glance, these photographs might appear identical. But after looking for some time, we realise each is unique and offers a slightly different composition of water and sky. Since the late 1980s, Laurence Aberhart has photographed the sea from many shores: from the North Island of New Zealand, Te Ika-a-Māui, to the north island of Japan, Hokkaido. Taken at twilight, each image depicts a turning point in the passage from day to night.

Aberhart uses a nineteenth-century camera to expose the large, glass plate negatives very slowly. What looks like a moment in time is in fact a series of moments, collected over up to an hour, compressed into a single photograph. Aberhart’s seascapes synthesise many minute fluctuations of light and tide, capturing the small changes in which time creeps forward.