significant hedgerow

The first photograph was taken on Christmas Day 2019, the second today. I wonder who is placing these artificial flowers here and why...

first walk of the year

The new year is long gone and I'm only just posting this image from my first walk of 2020. 

Walking with my sister (the day after her birthday in early January) we were rewarded with this view towards Chatsworth. A sheet of light beams lit the winter fields and revealed the kind of green that makes a heart soar. 

solstice walk

This Saturday I took myself off on a solo solstice walk. The town was busy with Christmas shoppers and I was glad to leave the tinsel bustle and walk into the hills surrounding Matlock. There was much to wonder at on the trails, complex fungi, new shoots, crystal flowing water, furry moss, bright berry jewels as I followed rich deep paths. At this darkest point of the year I was amazed by the grounded stirring within these woods, a surety and faith contained within all life forms. The cycle never still, turning of the earth, rolling of the seasons... 

Our ancestors would have measured their lives by these cycles and being aware of this connects in a small way to the people who came before. It also brings close an un-knowing, my reading of the woods dulled in comparison to past inhabitants of this place. In 2020 I hope to learn about and deepen my connection with this landscape and it's flora. Can I belong here? Can I find surety and faith?

the first cut is the deepest

As Derbyshire seeps into my skin, my lungs, it is inevitably seeping into my art. I've not worked with lino since I was a teenager in the 80's (another land...) and have surprised myself with the connection and joy I feel for the process of carving and printing. Below are my first efforts exploring lino and the boundaries that delineate this particular landscape: dry stone wall and hawthorn hedgerow.

These boundaries represent safety and respect within the work I'm developing... It's all about the boundaries.  

 Dry stone wall near Cromford, Derbyshire

Hedgerow near Bakewell, Derbyshire

scotland

 Burghead

 Roseisle

 Roseisle

 Burghead

 Findhorn

Findhorn Foundation

scotland

Last month I visited the places my father and his family came from: Elgin, Bernie, Lossiemouth and Burghead. These villages and towns are by the Moray Firth, along the North East coast of Scotland. The Moray Firth delineates the outermost edges of habitat for dolphins to survive (but not thrive) and the Aurora Borealis has been seen from this coast, it is a beautiful place. If you drew a straight line east from Elgin you would arrive at the southern tip of Norway, somewhere I was lucky enough to visit last year and the echo of Scotland was apparent in the landscape (and visa versa). I feel a strong connection to these lands and have a sense of home and belonging when I'm there. This trip was about creating space to be in, look at and experience by walking around and about. This time I was drawn to historic religious buildings and the particular vernacular of this region, structure, history, solid things that will outlive me.

I've visited this region of Scotland since I was a toddler, the agricultural landscape is in my blood somehow, the towns, the lanes, the skies, the deep rich soil, the scattered farms, the distilleries. To be there helps me in my understanding and communication with those who have gone before, my flesh and blood. Though it may sound romantic it's not particularly, I can understand that it was a hard life for them eking out their livings in these places and surviving two world wars. The other side of the coin is that they must have also experienced beauty in their lives and lived the spirit of these landscapes. They would have felt its power and their own power too.

Looking up from Elgin Cemetery

Elgin Cemetery - in memory of their children

Elgin Cathedral

Elgin Cathedral

Elgin Cathedral

Cathedral tombstone

Spynie Palace

 View towards Lossiemouth from Spynie

 Elgin

 Elgin

 Burghead

 Cooper Park, Elgin

   Pluscarden Abbey