It's that time of year again. I am preparing for an exhibition of my paintings, to be held in the GALE centre in Gairloch, Wester Ross. The same place where I held my Local Letterboxes exhibition last year. It is a lovely place; specially designed to be energy efficient - lots of wood and glass and light. There are huge floor to ceiling windows along the front which look out over the sea towards Skye. Not just towards Skye, you can see the north end of the island. I took some photographs of the building last year, which you can see above. I'm not quite sure that whoever put the sign together in the top middle photograph had fully thought through what the finished article would look like. Perhaps I am just being childish. Not that that is such a bad thing.
I am busy framing paintings, deciding which paintings to reproduce as prints, mounting work, putting together new sets of greetings cards and generally gathering my work together. It has given me a good chance to review what I have done in the past year. I realise I have probably not been as focused as I might have been. I start out with good intentions - to paint a series of boats, or buildings, or birds. And I end up with a smattering of each, a few birds, a few sheds and houses, some more boats. Perhaps that doesn't matter. This year's exhibition is entitled "Inspired by Scotland", so all of these subjects can happily be included. It's an eclectic mix. It will be interesting to see what people think.
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I could put it off no longer. The idea that had been fermenting in the back of my head for a significant period of time had come to fruition. Although if it was fermenting it should surely by now be an alcoholic beverage. Never mind the detail. I had an idea, ages ago. As you already know, I live in northeast Scotland. The referendum about whether or not Scotland should become independent from the rest of the UK is happening this year. On 18th September, to be precise.
Travelling around the country, I've noticed signs in windows, declaring the inhabitants' voting intentions. Personally, I never do this. Declare my intentions. It's an inherited trait; my parents never told each other how they were voting, in anything from local to general elections. Sometimes I haven't decided until I read the ballot paper. Sometimes I have. I don't believe it's anyone else's business. So I have been intrigued to see the signs in house windows. Playing on my own extremely indecisive nature, I thought it would be fun to create a painting incorporating the sense of history, along with the possibility that different members of one household are likely to have different opinions. A recent trip to Perthshire provided me with the source material; a photograph which I took of a quintessentially Scottish house. A large house in the country, true, but a sandstone one and typical of the area. The rest of the task involved putting pencil to paper, brush into water, into watercolour and a fair bit of time. I hope you enjoy the fruits of my labours. Now for the next task; to decide on a title. |
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