Peter Mearns has a fascination for the seaside which goes back to childhood days out on the southern English coast. In the late 1960s he first experienced the Mediterranean on camping holidays as a teenager and the people that inhabited those beaches had a big impact on him.

He observes the way people behave at beaches and swimming pools, the clothes they wear, the stuff they have with them, the physical positions they adopt, the social interaction, the intimacy, the colour, the light, the sand, pebbles and stones, the tiles and chrome, the beautiful and the grotesque – it’s a fascinating and endlessly changing scene which goes on everyday on many of the world’s coasts. He is interested in the small details of people’s bodies as well as the relationship of the figures with the landscape and seascape.

The more intimate images can be risky to capture without causing offence or getting into trouble so he tries to blend into the scene, taking his time and sometimes using family and friends as decoys. They are voyeuristic and he sometimes feels like a thief, stealing personal moments and things that don’t belong to him. He has been photographing for his Beach & Pool series for nearly 20 years in Europe, Australia, America, Asia and South America.