Delighted my photo of the Birsay Whalebone will be included in the fourth and final Summer Salon at Arti et Amicitiae, the Dutch fine arts society. Located on Orkney (Scotland),…
This Art Deco bungalow in Sidi Ifni (Morocco) dates from the time when this seaside town was colonised by the Spanish, who left as recently as 1969. Sadly, the house…
A talk about my work “Hiding the Wound: Homage to Mr. Freud” was held recently as part of the Coming Out exhibition at Birmingham Museums & Art Gallery. It was given by the very eloquent Andrea Bonnell and attended by a lively audience of staff members and general public.
I made this piece back in 1979 in response to Freud’s implication that women are “imperfect” and therefore inferior to men. Here, the act of sewing was not only a light-hearted reaction to the female experience of male supremacy but also, and more seriously, a symbolic surgical suture representing the desire for sexual autonomy. But that was then and, I wondered, how would people react nowadays to “Hiding the Wound”?
Andrea’s talk was deservedly a huge success and was followed by some very thought provoking discussions. Some people even took the trouble to leave written comments to be passed on to me. Here’s a selection: “Thank you for being bold and expressive. And for challenging constructs which pass others by. Your works seems even more relevant today and it feels like something which is essential to revisit periodically to redefine its meaning and relevance in the movement.”and “Simplicity and ‘non-drama’ make the piece resonate because female sexuality should not be an issue, nor a trophy for men.”
Originally shown at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool, the landmark exhibition Coming Out, Sexuality, Gender & Identity has now travelled on to the Birmingham Museum & Gallery. It features over 80…
Last summer, the Cloud Appreciation Society jointly launched a competition with Stromness Museum for the best cloud photos taken on any of the 72 islands of Orkney. The deadline is May 2018 and you can enter eight shots, which gives plenty of scope for clouds of all kinds and seasons. With its vast skyscapes, Orkney is the perfect location for appreciating clouds. So I too pointed my camera upwards and began to snap away.
It was an astonishing experience. Sometimes involving delicate sky calligraphy and sometimes suggesting Armageddon and impending doom.
After a few days, it became quite normal for me to wander through fields with my head almost literally in the clouds. And it’s a wonder that I didn’t fall over, especially as I felt distinctly light headed!
It’s October now and I will be returning to Orkney for an exhibition at the Northlight Gallery in Stromness. That’s an adventure in itself and will involve lots of hard work. But I’ll also be taking plenty of cloud breaks, which – without doubt – will give me a completely different perspective on the world. (more…)
Picture perfect? The early morning light, the ships and cloud reflections are all there, but so too is Orkney County Council with its extensive repairs to the water system. Personally I love a little imperfection: It shakes things up and throws them off balance. Location: Stromness, Mainland, Orkney
Inside the Broch of Gurness is an elegantly curved staircase dating from somewhere between 500 BC and 100 AD. People lived here and fought off attacks on the remote island of Mainland (Orkney), where the known world mainly comprised Norway to the north and Scotland and England to the south. (more…)
The Birsay Whalebone is a vertebra of a vast and long dead mammal from the front. From the back it’s a bird of prey zoning in on its next meal. For me, its twin aspects are both repellent and enthralling. Located on Mainland, Orkney, I know that all paths will lead to Birsay when I return there in January.
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Tomb of the Eagles shelter that was once a German WWII ambulance before being used as a mobile home for crossing the Sahara. But for me, this photo is not…
Scapa Flow shipwreck. Part of the German fleet that was scuttled during WWI and used as a blocking ship in WWII to prevent the entry of Nazi U-boats. It’s weird…
