A new exhibition featuring the beauty of Swaledale is being staged for visitors to the Dales Countryside Museum in Hawes later this month (Feb).

Called “Small Dale World – A Village in View”, it is a collection of photographs, watercolours and drawings by writer and photographer David Morgan Rees centred on Marske near Richmond.

In recent years the 80-year-old has devoted much of his time to documenting the basic realities of Marske, where he had a cottage for more than 30 years.

"My images in this exhibition are my own way of expressing the depth of my feelings for the local landscape, activities and atmosphere of this very special place," he said.

"I also felt it was very important to make a comprehensive visual record of a rural community at a particular period in the late 20th century.

“My years spent in a small cottage just outside the village have been perhaps the happiest and most fulfilling part of my life. I felt welcome from the first moment I arrived in Marske. It was made so easy for me to join in village life and participate in various activities and events. I was never made to feel I was an outsider. This gave me a remarkably close relationship with many people who I continue to regard as friends although sadly I have had to move away.”

He has written for a variety of publications, including The Dalesman, Yorkshire Journal and Yorkshire Life. As well as having worked as a radio freelance in the past for BBC Wales he has published three books: 'Yorkshire Craftsmen at Work' a survey in his words and photographs of traditional Yorkshire craftsmen, 'In the Palm of a Dale', a detailed portrait of Marske at the Millennium, where he bought a small cottage in 1973. His last book, 'Our Small Dale World', is a valediction and celebration in words and images of the time he spent at Marske, which so enriched his life.

The exhibition runs from 27 February to 28 March in the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority-owned Museum.

Museum Manager Fiona Rosher said: “The exhibition is a very personal look at a Dales village from David’s point of view and it captures perfectly the essence of the community.”