peternashphotography The Carrick-a-rede Rope Bridge is an iconic image, recognised worldwide to promote tourism in Northern Ireland. But few visitors to the County Antrim land mark on the rugged, wind swept yet spectacularly stunning Northern Irish coast are aware of the purpose beyond the bridge. For over 350 years a Salmon fishery has functioned from ‘the rock’ with the only access by a rope bridge which the fishermen had to put in place to access their fishery at the start of the season and removing it when the Salmon run had passed. Internationally renowned photographer, Peter Nash, a specialist in B&W documentary photography, whose limited edition hand prints are in the personal collection of many respected connoisseurs of fine art photography worldwide, created the only photographic record of this incredibly unique and labour intensive way of life back in 1994. Within a short time the fishery ceased to operate due to the decline in wild Salmon runs and a programme to buy out the fisheries in an attempt to preserve the Salmon stocks, leaving only the curiosity ‘the bridge’ as a tourist attraction. Carrick-a-rede,  Beyond the Bridge  by  Peter Nash The book is a hard back, high quality publication containing some 130 monochrome images over 120 pages documenting the enduring task of this remarkable way of life, now assigned to this book, finishing with a series of images showing how the new bridge, that must comply with health and safety laws, is put in place by a team of professional riggers, contrasting greatly with the fishermen doing the same task with no safety equipment or regard for their own safety or well being. The availability of the book is limited to the National Trust shops at the Giants Causeway and at the Carrick-a-rede shop as well as a limited number of local outlets. The book retails at £25:00 plus £5:00 P&P worldwide and copies ordered through our website will be signed. We have kept this book to a limited print run and made it available to a select number of retail outlets and have purposefully avoided dealing with any multinational and chain stores to keep it more exclusive. Peter Nash is currently working on several long term projects which will eventually be published.  Click here to visit the Carrick-a-rede website for more information on the book ‘the art of photography’ member of the professional photographers association northern ireland