ANOTHER VISIT FROM TOTTIE.

 

I’ve had another visit from Tottie Nadin, the journalist from the Western Isles Wanderer. I’m not sure what to make of her, or why she called in again. She crept up on me when I was down in the fruit garden weeding the strawberries under plastic. I felt a bit of an idiot having to crawl out backwards and presenting her with my rear end. She wanted to know if her article about the award had made any difference, but I wonder now if she might have had some hidden agenda. I mean she was only here the other day, or was that last month. Time seems to fast forward these days and no sooner have we started the week and its Sunday again. Her arrival was well timed if one is hoping for a cup of tea and a slice of that particularly fine fruit cake I’d made earlier in the day. When she asked about my latest work I felt another tour of the studio was in order, but once again I totally forgot to ask her for the £5 entry fee. Perhaps if I had done she might have bought some little thing to redeem her fiver, but as before she left empty handed and escaped without making a purchase. The long dry spell of no visitors is finally over with the sale this week of two of my “One man and his needle” books and an early 19^th century blue and white ladle for the grand total of £48.

Tottie did have a good look around and seemed very interested in my latest painting of Berneray cemetery, although I think she thought the subject matter totally unsaleable. It was by no means completed, but people often seem more interested in seeing the process rather than the finished article. I finished it today with the addition of a raven just to add a little life, or should that be death to the scene. It’s strange how these images I’ve had in my head as well as sketch book are only now finding their way onto canvas. On the easel now is group of buildings on Eriskay that I sketched back in 2011

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Although that sketch was at the time a very quick loose one there is sufficient information that will allowed me to turn it into an oil painting. The studio has become increasingly crowded as I continue stockpiling. That’s the term I’ve used in the past, for those barren years when living in Brittany, and I’ve had no exhibitions organised or customers calling.

I though it odd that Tottie once again came by bus, surely a professional journalist would drive a car. I didn’t think to ask to see the article she’d written about me and my gallery, and have since wonder about the magazine itself. I know there are a multitude of glossy magazines about the Scottish Islands, but I’ve never heard of or seen the Western Isles Wanderer, and imagine it to be one of those journals only obtainable by subscription. From the start I’ve taken her at face value and it seems a bit churlish and certainly way too late in the day to start asking her for ID. I suppose I could have been a bit more inquisitive about her work, as well as that rather strange award. At the time I was rather flattered by the idea that someone had recognised my presence here at the end of the road, but then how did they known I’ve had nobody visiting. Now having given it some thought it does seem rather bazar, although why would she go to so much trouble just to get into my studio for free. Maybe she had a bet with a friend that she could get in for nothing, but that doesn’t explain the second visit. Is she after my body? I should have made it clearer form the outset that these days due to my cancer treatment I’m brimming over with female hormones and find it impossible to grow a moustache let alone a general election.

No, I’m letting my mind run away in flights of fancy, she’s a fine looking woman, probably a good fifteen years younger than myself. I’m reading way too much into her visits, but who knows she might be a gold digger. If she turns up again I’ll have to do some digging of my own.      

Trees.

 

In 2005, having scattered my father ashes on the island of Davaar in the mouth of Campbeltown harbour I decided to follow in his footsteps and take the ferry from Oban to the Outer Hebrides. During the summer of 2000 and at the age of eighty my father had visited the islands in his little Mercedes camper van, travelling from Barra up to the Butt of Ness. On June 24^th of that year his roaming took him as far as Garry beach and he spent the night at Traigh Mhor. Before leaving he stopped at the village shop and took a photo looking down to the peat stacks opposite.

 My father was not a good photographer, but what he captured in that image illustrates to me just how the landscape has changed over relatively few years. Historically the impression of the outer islands is one devoid of trees, and that apart from an area of woodland around Lews Castle the place is barren mountains, moorland and machair. An elderly neighbour informed me that when he was a boy the sycamore over the road from the shop and one up by the church were the only trees in Tolsta, and when driving into Stornoway the first and only tree was another sycamore at the Newmarket junction. Since then the tree beyond the church has gone, but there has been considerable if somewhat sporadic planting of conifers and deciduous trees throughout the island. Today the top end of Glen Tolsta has a mature stand of pines, although at the far end many of those have toppled with the north easterly gales. A later planting was almost entirely destroyed by fire during a dry summer when a portable barbeque was abandoned. Since then I’ve taken seedlings from the top side and planted them along with a mix of spruce and alders around my own home at 17 New Tolsta.

 My planting was inspired by Muriel and Andy King who 30 years ago planted a large amount of trees around their own croft house at No 13 as well as on the top side of Croft 15. When I first arrived here in 2006 the old white house and larger modern house on croft 14 were clearly visible, today only the dormer windows and roof of the white house remain visible. The far end of New Tolsta has become a little oasis of woodland before the vast open tract of moorland and in time my own planting of beach, birch and oak will help expand that. The visual aspect of these islands are changing with increasing speed, particularly with the building of massive houses. Gone are the days when ten children were raised in the dim smoky interior of a blackhouse or a two up two down croft house. Today houses that look to me more like a community village hall seem to sprout up overnight like mushrooms, demanding that sea view and dominating the horizon. My hope would be that in years to come some considered planting might soften their visual impact, meanwhile I will continue to plant trees, for surely a little shelter can please both man and beast.

When pushing my mother, then aged 93 in a wheelchair through a stand of fine beach trees she told me she’d spent most of her childhood climbing trees. I did the same, climbing as high as the branches would allow, but never told her. I thought my daring might frighten her and I would be grounded. In one particular section of woodland I could traverse from tree to tree like a chimpanzee never touching the ground. In later life when living in Brittany I would during the stormy winter months climb as high as I could into the old oak tree just to feel the twisting and creaking of branches beneath me. I cannot imagine a life that didn’t include the planting of trees. I’ve planted hundreds over the years; seen birds nest in them, gathered fruit from them, coppiced them, felled them for burning and building, as well as the making of furniture.

I will not live to see the trees I’ve planted here in New Tolsta reach anywhere near maturity, but the pleasure I derive from seeing their yearly growth is immense, and in my imagination I am once again walking beneath a fine stand of mixed woodland with limbs large enough to suspend a hammock that can cradle me.

SOLD II Australia.

 

Looking back over the past thirty five years I find it admiral to think that I have managed to survived through my artistic output. There have been many lean years, some when I’ve had no exhibitions and earned nothing at all, some that have seen surprising sales, and others where I’ve managed to travel the world and pay my way. During this time I’ve taken on no commissions and I have painted entirely for my own pleasure. For two decades I took biannual trips to Western Australia, initially to see my old friend Charley, but during that period I made many more good friends. Along with my sketch pads, I took with me to WA that sense of intimacy I found within Breton countryside. The skies seemed so big down under and the horizon so flat. I found myself searching for a way to create some sort of foreground interest that would lead me into the vastness of the outback. 

The south west corner of WA still retains some wonderful natural forest, and like so many other things Australian trees can obtain great heights. I climbed the 78m high Bicentennial Tree taking sketch book and pens, and spent many happy hours sketching massive tingle trees. I visited many well-known places, but I also discovered others that one could imagine had not seen a human being pass that way in decades or even centuries. 

There were privileged close encounters with nature that still rest vivid in my mind. I wandered along coastal paths, bashed my way through seemingly impenetrable bush and swam with dolphin from beaches that I was told were only accessible by boat. I discovered aboriginal sites that even locals had no knowledge of; trod carefully along fisherman’s coastal paths that required the nimbleness of a mountain goat, trudged up the vast white sand dunes beyond Duns Rocks to watch male emus and their young silhouetted against the setting sun, clambered through crumbling granite rock in a cave on Hammer Head that brought me out, like some strange rodent onto the top of the headland and a view to the archipelago of islands off the Cape Le Grand National Park. I made ascents of Mount Le Grand, Frenchman's Peak, Bluff Knoll, Peak Charles and many more often than not in staggering heat. 

I swam every day and never gave a thought to sharks, slept under the stars and discovered my own miniscule presence in the vastness of the universe. My creative output during these trips gave rise to several exhibitions and sales that allowed me to return. 

      

A SECOND VISIT By Tottie Nadin.

 

 

It was one of those beautiful Hebridean days, somewhat rare so far this year, but a day never the less to be out enjoying a stroll along the beach. The easiest for me is to hop on the W5 bus to Tolsta and ride it right to the end where I can amble around to Garry Beach or trudge the full length of Traigh Mhor beach. I was sorely tempted to stop off at other beaches along the way but there is something about being out there at end of the road that made me sit patiently for the extra ten minutes ride. Alighting along with two other beach lovers at the last junction before the bus made its return around the New Tolsta loop I noticed that not only was the Studio 17 sign displayed on the fence, but clearly visible outside the house was an open sign. As all three of us set of down the hill I got chatting with the couple from the bus. They’d both read the Peter May trilogy and had spent the previous day up at Ness. They’d identified the shed where the body had been discovered and visited the Harbour Gallery where they’d bought a pack of brightly coloured cards. They were now keen to discover this Bridge to Nowhere. Purely out of curiosity I asked them if they had seen the sign for Studio 17 back at the junction. They said they had, but couldn’t imagine why anyone would come all this way out just for a haircut. I explained it was an award winning art gallery, but we had reached that point in the road where Traigh Mhor beach displays its vastness and their attention had been drawn to their phones and taking snap shots. On rounding the bend to Garry they strode off down the hill, while I cocked a leg over the broken fence and took the cliff edge walk down to the beach. The tide was well out as people made their way around to the castle stack and the cave, but my mind kept drifting back to Studio 17 and Tom sitting in his gallery busy on his latest creation. Had he started painting again as he said he wanted to do, or was he still embroidering his tweed remnants. I would have to pay a visit before I caught the bus home.

There was nobody in the studio on my arrival so I rang the house doorbell, still no reply. Had he just wandered off and forgot the open sign? I ventured down to his barn workshop and beyond to the fruit and vegetable plot, still no trace of him until I came to a low homemade plastic tunnel, and here protruding from the open end were two feet. He was on his hands and knees weeding the strawberries. There is no easy way to interrupt someone who is deep in concentration and believes themselves to be totally alone, so I went for a cheery hello. A head jerked up against the plastic and then he shuffled his way out. “Oh it’s you again, did you forget something?” I explained I was simply curious to see how things were going and if my article had made any difference to his foot fall. “No, not a jot”, he replied with a grin, “Haven’t seen a sole”. I suggest that his award for the least visited attraction on the western isles was well place and he could only agree.

“Do you fancy a cuppa and a piece of cake, I was baking this morning, and I need a break from this?”

I was intrigued, the man also baked. Before I left I also discover he was a jam maker as he sent me off with a pot of last year’s blackcurrant jelly. I asked him how the creative side was going and he guided me back out to the gallery. He had indeed started painting again and on the easel was his latest unfinished work. I was somewhat taken aback to see the jumble of stones and what I would have considered to be the least saleable subject matter. “My favourite graveyard on the island of Bernaray”, said Tom, sits up on the hillside with an outer wall covered in brilliant orange lichen.

“Is there any calling for pictures of graveyards?”

Tom looked at me sideways “I’d never given it a thought, but aren’t they beautiful”. There is something very appealing about the naivety of this man, living in a world of his own, and as I stared at the unfinished picture I caught a glimpse of the beauty he spoke of. There was not the slightest trace of painting for anyone else other than himself, which I found refreshing. It was only during the bus ride home cradling my pot of jam that I realised I had once again not paid that £5 entry fee, which made me think I will simply have to call in again and see if I remain his only visitor.