Nature Lab

Saturday 17th June - Thursday 29th June 2023

Northlight Gallery, Stromness, Orkney

An exhibition of Drawings, Prints and Textiles.

I’ve called this exhibition Nature Lab because it brings together work I've made over the past few years based on engaging with the natural environment, both around me in Orkney but also in Norway.

A sense of place has been a key part of my artist’s practice. I'm curious about the natural world and the changing seasons. I’m a collector of seaweed, lichen and Summer grasses. I've explored these natural forms in various ways: first of all through close observation through pencil and ink drawings, large charcoal and pastel works and then I've been exploring printmaking directly from the grasses on a range of different papers. I particularly like printmaking with tissue paper because of both the fragility and translucency of the images that I can create.

In the show there are pen and ink drawings, printmaking on tissue paper and on Bible paper which is a very strong archival paper. Some of my prints on canvas deliberately have the feel of Anna Atkins’ cyanotypes in her very early photography of seaweed. Some of the work was made during the pandemic: lichen that I gathered while working in Norway and brought home in March 2020, which became the artwork I was working on in those first scary days of COVID. This includes a textile piece: ‘Blue Lichen.’ Last summer I paired my lichen drawings with ink observations of delicate red algae that I found on Mae Sands in Westray.

I love this space in Northlight Gallery and I wanted it to have the feel of my artist’s studio on Westray where I can bring in seaweed from the beach, press grasses and have things I've made and collected all around me. I wanted to bring that variety of natural objects into this small space for it to be celebrated. I'm curious about the botanical specimens that I find but I am not an expert and am constantly trying to find out more about them. The idea of a nature lab is somewhere where people can come and have a look at the work, the drawings, the objects and share their knowledge of this unique environment.

Below is a selection of pieces in the exhibition. All works are for sale - please use the contact tab above if you are interested in purchasing a piece.

Tissue paper prints on canvas with mixed media. Unframed