celebrating… Life on Earth

Tis September, and autumn marks time for harvest…

Harvesting fruits out of projects – to the poet, tis the moment to celebrate words ripe enough to shine and echo through folk’s hearts…

Months turned in weeks, as Mother Earth waltzes in grace amid the void and songs from stars, light from our Sun reminds of life – from the vegetal to birdsong, September shines and celebrates.

Fleurs de saison, like seeds of life from a planet en route to changes of her own… Let’s reel seasons, as the island sings and flowers – where life as free as flocks of birds comes to da loch to drink or bathe.

Tis that moment I celebrate.

Clumlie Loch shared at WordPlay 2021.

Tis the same that has journeyed from hills and burn (stream) down to the sea to settle among other greats and less known voices in two towns, Lerwick and Edinburgh, through the summer.

Clumlie Loch celebrates wild life – tis where we witness wilderness as important as rainforests or melting ice at either poles… Because it homes essence of life.

Clumlie Loch at the Virtual Exhibition by the the WWF Scotland’s Great Scottish Canvas Initiative, 18-26 Sep ’21 during Climate Fringe.

Today, The Great Scottish Canvas has begun to display it in a virtual exhibition. Such an honour to map Shetland to the greatest of Earth Summits.

It will feature in November among others and other art forms – 45 in total , from 45 Scottish voices, poets, writers, visual artists and sculptors… 45 voices to trigger a beam of hope for life on Earth… Our survival as a species and for our homeworld, natural.

Teeming life at Clumlie Loch, 2021.

Nature, so inspiring, our garden of Eden, we ought to protect at all costs.

Let’s hope and pray, our words and works speak to all world leaders in Glasgow. Like Jackie Kay, Scottish icon as a poet & former Makar – she, the insatiable optimist – I believe in wisdom and future in which children will bloom and grow in a rich world where animals and plant can live.

I feel humbled, honoured and chuffed for Clumlie Loch to feature among Jackie’s and others’ works, blown up on walls to they eyes and hearts of all COP26 participants.

Let’s enjoy Hairst and life on Earth, where our hearts beat.

Ian’s world at Troswick, Sep 2021.

Thank you for life. 🙂

Announcement (1)

In such extraordinary and industrious comes a first fruit, which has ripened well.

Now official :

I am very honoured and privileged to map Shetland at COP26 Glasgow through The Great Scottish Canvas this September with the publication for the great event later this autumn, and live reading of my selected poem to our Scottish MSPs as part of Climate Fringe, which will go live in due time.

I am very humbled this poem, very close to my heart, is journeying in so many directions so far. Shortlisting it at such level was so unexpected. Tis also voice recorded for the purpose of the exhibition. Happy poet. 🙂

More to come!

outcry

It’s all about adding and substracting… In the artist’s own words.

Paul Bloomer’s latest exhibition ar the Shetland Museum & Archives in Lerwick, Scotland, UK, feels an epic saga in charcoal, cladding the whitest of walls inside da Gadderie, that non-static space devoted to the muable world.

The huge pictures felt they had been tailored to perfection. Paul needs to create his own creative time at his Bigton studio when he is not lecturing at the Shetland College at Gremista, or travelling to Europe with (or without) his students. 

My top favourite picture – swans’ flight –  was inspired by a recent trip to Vienna…  A regular visitor to Spiggie Loch as a visual artist or devoted angler, I was both surprised and amused to hear it on Sunday as Paul spoke of each charcoal on paper gigantic pictorial metaphors. 

Originally from the Black Country, Paul anchored his heart &  art  on this symbolic latitude where time and space are regulated by light and darkness in that perpetual dance of seasons.

However, as an islander, he too looks at the world in a unique perspective. 

And he works like a poet or a writer, with a pocket size sketchbook, to capture moments he will later reproduce on a gargantuan scale… 

Paul makes parallels between people and avian migration. His dreams transcend through circles… Black versus white.  

He constantly reminds us how mankind generates that poisoning world, itself pictured as a leitmotive throughout and in various ways, metaphors, as Paul reflects on each throughout that Sunday afternoon stroll in his presence.

Paul the environmentalist – politically engaged… Raged by a poisoning world, in which political disciples hide, such as those deduced by populism. His charcoal stick does not fail to challenge the viewer…

He nonetheless searches for lightness through nature, to find love and sensuality among geese, swans or starlings, Shetland’s commonest and yet captivating birds.

Sensuality expressed though the oneness of entangling whooper swans.

Paul very aptly entitled his exhibition a prayer for the healing of nations.

A must see. 🙂 

mapped

  My flair served me right once more. To dull Saturday afternoon, I felt compelled to find out how the world’s cartographers, marine charters and surveyors – from the Antiquities to the past century – looked at this corner of the realm.
Thule, no longer a mystery.

    

 

Through centuries & millennia, mariners have relied to hydrographic charters for navigation, and search for safe passages.

      
  I love the way those surveyors shaped the islands, and even if wars stimulated needs of monarchs – or politicians & merchants – the Dutch remained rhe champions of all marine charters! 

  
And for those of you, lucky enough to visit my local museum in Letwick, Da Gadderie celebrates the life & work of James Robertson, the Shetlander who mapped Jamaica.

  
What a fabulous insight into the world of maps. 
 

viking

Not an occupational hazard, but a marvellous world, where we, poets, writers and artists, mingle and collaborate to bring alive our heritage.

This weekend, somewhere in Norfolk, at King’s Lynn Hanse House, a multi-disciplinary collaborative project – entitled The Nine Realms – is celebrating the Viking world. It is the fruit from a wonderful tree, curated and nurtured by Nicky Mortlock c/o ArtiPeeps. It has brought together a long boat load of writers and artists, as well as a boat (head) carver and Millfield School – younglings, who have been participating to the project in their own words.

Two links here, should you wish to acquire a copy of The Nine Realms’ Poetry Book, and or The Nine Realms’ School Book. Now, and if you are lucky enough to visit Norfolk – King’s Lynn this weekend and/or Norwich Library – where there will be poetry read by the poets present there on Monday – please do go along and leave your prints in the guest book! I, the poet based on my 60N latitude, am here in spirit.

“Vikings Ahoy!”, Nicky and all!

Have a marvellous time, everyone!

showcase

  It takes a gang of lens’ lovers to assemble thoughts & pixels for a project sleek & visual.
  
It takes time & dexterity to sit & select 80 images (out of a pack of 300) to grace the walls of Da Gadderie, Shetland’s SMA&A’s non-permanent exhibition space for a good part of a summer.

  It takes pleasure to see folk smile and share their thoughts & reactions on the first day as they embark on a journey between four walls…
  
It was a pleasure to see you. There is still time to come and see how we present our shared home world – how we look at all its treasures, and thank you all for your visit, wherever you began your journey.

  

Five Photos, Five Stories – Day 5

Final night, and attempt. 

The image I chose fired up my poet’s imagination, as I stood before the very work of art, produced by a locally-based artist, as part of the Malakoff Exhibition last month at our local Art Gallery in Weisdale.

 
I devoted it a blog post not so long ago…

And now to its own poetics-

Shipwright

 No bones, just 

rust.
They say

they nailed you on a wall,

framed inside wood,

sea drifter’s 

dream,

but

as

currents

took you apart,

you lost your legs as 

a sailor, and 

let salt 

gnaw 

through

your rib cage.

What’s come of you

defies earth’s 

tides,

lightless

iris lost in riptides,

your joie de

vivre in

prey

to

dust…

What’s left of you,

but eyes of metal on 

the wall.
© Nat Hall 2015

Thank you for such challenge, Jane Dougherty. Highly enjoyed 🙂

Chalk n’ Cheese

 
I love bruck. 

…Not any bruck. The one you find washed off from the sea – the one that can be recycled into artistic  meaningfulness  – rubbish turned creative with a strong sense of place.

Somebody’s work that awakes your senses, makes you whisper “wow” and lights up your own imagination. 

Shetland’s main Gallery based in Weisdale – Bonhoga – has a knack to attract a palette of artistic minds in order to please everyone (interested in the Creative Industries).

Two great examples notably include Malakoff and Shadowed Valley – two distinct exhibitions recently viewed in this micro-hub.

Art is subjective. Art is a dialogue, a connection between two minds via a product or a medium. It talks to you, or it does not… It feels as whimsical as an orb in the forest. In any case, let us allow such encounters in order to write our stories. 🙂

   
   

   
     

Above, that transformed bruck from our island-based collective… 

   
   

   
     

Something different for everyone 🙂

out

Transformations

ArtiPeeps’ 15 month collaboration between world poets & artists – celebrated on 12-14 September at Hanse House in King’s Lynn, Norfok, England, edited by the Project’s Curator, now comes to you in its printed form.
Ovid’s Metamorphoses revisited and fit for our 21st Century world.

Just click on the link and order your copy.
It will transform you!

brushstrokes

An occasional holiday allows many of us to catch up with the world.
I seized that free weekday to visit my local museum in order to catch up with a promise, that of enjoying the latest exhibition at Da Gadderie.

I must confess the Shetland Museum & Archives picked the follow-up to Writing The North exhibition with flair, and What Seas, What Shores follow in the footsteps of the former.

Two archipelagos once again on show till the end of June, and celebrating their respective land / sea scapes would make us once again travel between Orkney & Shetland.

Today’s voyage of discovery made me discover selected works from Laura Drever & Diana Leslie, based in Orkney, as well as that of Gail Harvey, Glasgow born – Shetland based.

On the other hand, my eyes & heart found themselves back on very familiar ground with Paul Bloomer & Ruth Brownlee, whose respective works speak very vividly to my senses.

On this occasion, Bloomer chose to explode with extraordinary colours in his interpretation of Aurora borealis – locally named as da mirrie dancers.

I just love the way he played with colours.
Ruth has always captured seascapes with such flair her works make you taste seas pray on your lips.
As a poet & photographer, I am sensitive to my local seascapes, and Ms Brownlee’s work has long captured my imagination & deep admiration as an artist.

Her world speaks of home through her oil & other media’s pigments.
Great exhibition not to be missed if you are wandering on our northern latitude. It’s a cracker!