Hebridean Dreaming: STUDIO PAINTING

Hebridean Dreaming: STUDIO PAINTING: During the past fortnight I’ve returned more towards the paintbrush than needle. The major project to embroider flora and fauna on the N...

STUDIO PAINTING

During the past fortnight I’ve returned more towards the paintbrush than needle. The major project to embroider flora and fauna on the New Tolsta map quilt has seemed such an open ended task that some light relief of painting where I can complete a picture in a matter of days was a welcome bonus. Even when I’m not painting the process still goes on in my head as I imagine various subjects and compositions. There are some that are as well to rest in my head and never to emerge but there are others that I am itching to get onto canvas, and when they do eventually come into the light of day there is a great sense of joy with just how quick that image arrives. Painting should never be difficult or laboured as it will always show in the unsatisfactory end result. If during the painting process I find myself struggling with the image then I take a tea-break or a walk and usually on returning the problem is resolved. However there are times when the problem remains and the picture must be abandoned. This is rare and usually only happens after a sustained period of studio painting when all I need to do is get back out there and reconnect with the subject matter; a walk down to the beach or a trudge out onto the moor whatever the weather. It is hardly surprising that the subject of Garry beach figure often in my pictures as I not only walk there but work there when cutting peat. Familiarity with this delightful east facing beach and the history of past human habitation and activities are intriguing but the play of light during changing weather conditions make it endlessly fascinating. Being a popular place for camper van tourists and dog walking locals it is important for me that I don’t simply reproduce the classic snap shot image that everyone will recognise. I have sketchpads full of drawing of Garry to accompany a large folder of photographs and I often find myself working from several different images. My latest studio painting was executed using three sketches and two photographs with an element of artistic licence to create the required composition.

 The painting of the castle stack taken from the far cliffs demanded a similar mix of sketches and photos and the more restricted square format meant that the subject matter remains very much about the elevated perspective of the stack and its relationship to the silhouette of Seabhal beyond.

 The slightly smaller square painting looking up to Seabhal from the beach is more about the patterns formed by the burn running across the sand from the loch.

Another favourite with all visitors is the “bridge to nowhere” although being an entire bridge it does in fact go somewhere as it spans the deep granite gorge. 

To obtain the impressive dominance that Lord Leverhume intended when choosing this site for the cast concrete bridge one needs to view it from down in the gorge at river level which means a scramble and then locating a comfortable rock to perch and sketch from. This is not a suitable place from which to set up an easel so the subject seen from this angle requires it to be a studio painting.         

                      

COMPLETING THE PICTURE AND THE GENTLE ART OF FAKING..

Back in the summer of 1987 my father bought an oil painting by the Cornish artist Billie Waters and it was quite obvious even without reading the auctioneer’s description that it depicted Hayle harbour. Although somewhat stylised it showed clearly the old factory buildings and storehouses plus the distinctive row of houses that still stand above the inner harbour. The style is typical of between the world wars and I could immediately see how the deceptively simple almost child-like image had caught my father’s eye. The subtle soft pallet of colours indicated the brushwork of a female hand and it soon found a home on the upstairs landing. On the reverse of the canvas was another abandoned oil sketch of a harbour and what I took to be a view of Hayle harbour from a different view point. The rather heavy half round moulded frame did not please my father and it was changed for something lighter, while making sure that the original was stored safely away.

Thirty years on and the painting hung in my brother house having been reunited with its original frame and I was once again intrigued by the abandoned sketch. As I was going to St Ives the following day I took a photograph and when stopping off in Hayle to buy a vegetarian pasty would take a wander around the harbour area. With pasty in hand I walked in and around the harbour taking in all the most likely spots but nothing fell into place and it became obvious that the sketch was not of Hayle. Cornwall is well off for harbours and I began to think it was an impossible task to now make any sense of the sketch, so I logged the image away in my head and thought no more about it.

A full year passed and on a stormy winters day I was invited with my brother down to Porth Leaven for lunch with a friend. After a delicious lasagna lunch we battle against the wind down to the harbour front and as we arrived alongside the outer entrance it all slipped into place. That logged Billie Waters sketch came back to me and I rushed up the side street with camera in hand to take some shots of where thought it might have been drawn from. My memory had not failed me and it was obvious that the sketch was indeed of Porth Leaven harbour. It took another visit to locate more exactly the original observation point as close to the old war memorial and at that point I knew that I had to complete the painting.

 I took a tracing of the sketch as a guide and tried to interoperate every possible relevant brush stroke and with the aid of my present day photographs I completed the image. One thing still puzzled me with the south facing façade of the central foreground building in that in the sketch it was painted white and there were only three windows on each floor. On examining the building it was obvious that two larger windows had been added on each floor, but was it ever white? Researching some old black and white photos indicated that at one point the building had indeed been painted white. So this modern trend to paint everything white including natural stone is not an entirely recent thing.

Billie Waters had abandoned that sketch probably eighty years ago and it was now my task to complete the picture. After three days I felt I had arrived at a passable effort that would sit comfortably alongside the original making a pair to Hayle harbour.

The story however is not entirely over because while the oil sketch of Porth Leaven was clear enough there also remains another partial sketch beneath this. The most obvious part of the second sketch is a large blue oval body of what looks like water to the left with three black splodges. There are other indications of brushwork that have been whited over and bare no relation to the harbour sketch but I can as yet make little sense of these other than it could be an attempt from closer quarters to capture the flow of water out of through the inner habour wall. Could this yet turn out to be three for the price of one?              

Cooking on a quiet Sunday.

I try to make it a rule to always cook something when the Rayburn is lit. Even on a cold wet miserable day when it would seem enough effort simply to allow it to heat the water and radiators I like to get something in the oven. On inspecting the larder there was ample cake on the shelf, the biscuit tin was full and below the jam and preserves looked healthy.

 Then as I admired the wonderful sponge mincer that I’d picked up for a pound years ago an idea sprang to mind. I’d make kale and potato cakes as I had both in the garden and maybe I could try mincing the blanched curly kale and brown bread. It worked a dream and I have enough for the rest of the week.

 Don't you just hate people who take photos of food! Traditionally they are served with cold gammon, or with bacon or grilled sausages but unless some road-kill turns up I’ll be sticking to the staple vegetarian mushroom and cheese omelette. I had the remaining mushroom soup at lunchtime, made with field mushrooms that I’d filled my bonnet with when down sketching on Garry beach. I can guarantee here in New Tolsta that any fresh mushrooms are mine by rights or more accurately because I’m the only one who would dare eat anything that didn’t come in a plastic supermarket wrapper. “I’ve only poisoned myself once” I say with gay abandon and see them determined to politely decline any invite to dine at Tom’s house. This year with the dry summer I gave up bothering with growing lettuce as I now prefer the lemon tang of wild sorrel that grows here in abundance. I’m also celebrating not buying any jam having been self-sufficient on that front for the past thirty years.

Having finished cooking I put the scrubbed deer’s head on the Rayburn to dry. A neighbour had found it on the moor and brought it round for me in the week. Wonderful that the sight of a dead skull should immediately make people think of me.       

ALL IS SAFELY GATHERED IN>

It’s been a record breaking year on so many front and many experienced peat cutters say they’ve never known a year so dry. Back at the beginning of May while others were sweating it out jogging along the track from the bridge to nowhere I was hard at work at my peat banks. De-turfing is perhaps the most detested job as there is nothing to show for the effort but once the top layer of peat is revealed I get a genuine sense of excitement for the work that is to follow. The first cut with the tairsgeir (peat iron)     and the season starts. Count up to 30 as I cut, then I stop and throw that batch. The process is repeated ten times and then I’m done for the day. Anymore and I risk getting into serious trouble with my back. Throwing is a real art and when done correctly with skill so that each peat fly throw the air several meters to land perfectly alongside its neighbour takes years of practice that I don’t have. Most of the time I have to double handle in order to get the first cut thrown well out and afford room for the next two or sometimes three layers. After two hours I’ve had enough and return to continue another less strenuous form of creative work in the calm of my studio.

After two weeks of lying flat the cut peat should be ready to lift and set up on edge. There many methods to achieve this but I prefer the herringbone form with a roof capping which allows the maximum expose surface to both sun and wind as the drying continues. This year I was lifting after just a few days and within six weeks most were ready to bring home. So it was time to call on Murry with his tractor already fitted with the double wheels and a large peat stack piled high outside the back of his house. All fit for Monday evening so get a team together. George, Donald, Norman, Mats and myself should be fine. Murry was already parked up at the banks and loading as we arrived and everyone stepped easily into the rhythm of work.

 There is something very special about working as a team that I think everyone can recognise and so the conversation and banter flow easily. With the first tailor full Murry heads back up across rough ground that’s a fine test of our skill in building a load. As we wait there is time to chat, reminisce and catch up on village news and as the chill of the evening breeze starts to bite the tractor returns and it all hands for the second load. This time it’s topped off with a few bags of caorans (smaller pieces of the best black but crumbling peat). Job done and back at the house the fruits of all that labour lie awaiting to be neatly stacked. I’ve changed the position this year having chopped up and removed a pile of old timber from the back I now have room for a slightly more sheltered placement.

 I plan to incorporate the bags of caorans into the centre of the stack so returned to the moor with my van and the wheelbarrow. Having wheeled up 20 bags there now remains only a further 16 but they will have to wait as my back has finally stopped me in my tracks and is demanding rest.

THE STORY BEHIND THE DOOR.

I have with age become a creature of habit at least for the start of each day. There is something very reassuring and comforting in a routine whereby I can break my fast without having to put my brain in gear at this early hour. Like millions of others I fill the kettle and turn it on without a moment’s thought as to where the power is coming from to make it boil. Then I step outside to greet the day which in recent weeks has been glorious and walking across the gravel I pluck a sprig of fresh mint to throw in the pot of green tea. Back inside I open the corner cupboard door and remove a late 18^th century blue and white transfer printed bowl and from the hook below a heavy Irish potato print mug. Tea and muesli gets me through to mid-morning but today my mind went back to that blue painted corner cupboard door and the story behind it.

This door like most of the objects in my house has history. It came into my possession some thirty odd years ago when I purchased a small 18^th century full standing pine corner cupboard painted in drab brown. From the start it seemed to me that the door was not original and on carefully scraping away several layers of paint from the body of the cupboard the original blue colour was revealed. However the door showed no trace of blue and proved to be a later addition. The cupboard was sold on with a handsome profit while the door was consigned to my wood store along with other scraps that I was sure would one day come in handy.

When in 1912 I moved to Brittany there was some serious sorting out but somehow the door still with its original glass survived the skip and moved with me. For several years it remained stacked away with lumps of heavy Breton chestnut and oak until the day I decided to construct a cold frame to bring on seedlings; the door would, face down make an ideal lid. Over the next few years it withstood the elements reasonably well but the paint became flaked under a baking sun and the damp had penetrated the animal glued joints and puttied glazing. I decided its days where over and so dismantled it and retrieved the glass. Once again it was placed back in the wood store but this time tied up with string in a flat pack condition and there it remained for ten years.

It has always surprised me that in our square cornered homes there are so few corners that will take a corner cupboard and the kitchen here in New Tolsta is no exception with three of the corners being taken up by doors and the forth has the hot and cold water pipes running down on the surface of the V lining boards. However there was enough room to build a cupboard and perhaps the old flat packed door would prove useful. I retrieved it from the wood store and even managed to find the six original panes of glass. That summer in Scotland I reassembled it and built it into the kitchen giving it that coat of blue paint it had always lacked. The most extra ordinary thing, after a chequered history of almost 200 years is that it still retained its original lock and key. Eat your heart out IKEA.

Moorland trudging from Tolsta to Muirneag.

During my moorland tramping west of New Tolsta the distant silhouette of Muirneag has for the most part been simply a directional guide looming on the horizon. One day I’ll head out there, one day. Well today was that day as the skies clouded over and a gentle breeze picked up which meant I would neither get over heated or troubled by horse flies or midges. The first part of the walk was over familiar ground as shortly after 8.30 I crossed the road and joined the track leading up to Loch Diridean. At the end my goal sat far off 248m above sea level and only four little squares away on the Ordnance Survey map that is 4 kilometre as the crow flies. There are those who would be thinking quad bike but for me that’s way too noisy and my back wouldn’t stand the shaking up, so trudging it is, one foot in front of the other. I took a direct line across the divide of upper and lower Loch na Cloich and noted a distinct drop in water levels since my last time here.

 Even more rocks protruding from the water and here I stopped for water and a slice of homemade ginger and walnut flap jack. Like the carrot dangling before the donkey I find promising myself something to eat when I reach certain points does help and the next would be on reaching the summit. The middle section of the walk across A’ Chleith Mhor is about 2 kilometres and as I tend to look down as Muirneag seems still depressingly far off.

 And there I almost trod on it is the large vivid green caterpillar of The Emperor moth way out in the middle of the moor. I would have expected it more likely to be on willow or birch but my book tells me it does live on heather and at low levels it shows less tendency to melanise so less black than green. Later it will spin a pear shaped brown silk cocoon in which the large violet-brown pupa will lay dormant for two or more winters before the moth finally emerges.

Now at the foot of Muirneag and with a last look up I start the slow climb resisting the temptation to lift my gaze further than a few yards in front. One foot in front of the other and slowly the world beyond the great moor opens up to the south as far as Skye. Slight moisture on the air but nothing that will bring rain as I plod onwards and upwards.

 And there it is the rounded summit with its trig point surrounded by a circle of rocks and I’ve made it. As I make the slow circuit from the hills of Harris up the west coast to the Butt, eastward to the mainland and south back down to Stornoway I feel the joy of elevation. Being alone and accompanied only by a stiff breeze I have the eye of the eagle. If I could simple unfold those wings and glide high over the conceal Celtic mythological Tir nan Og, the Land of the Ever-Young. A land very different than that before me now. One reason for climbing so high was to see the Isle of Lewis before any more wind turbines arrive, raw as nature intended. Up here even the heather grows in a miniaturised form but Muirneag has been violated like so many other remote places throughout the world by the quad bike and just below the trig point the fragile vegetative surface has been churned up to expose sun bleached rocks. There must be an easier route to the summit from the west since I saw no evidence of bike tracks as I climbed the east slope. 

At 65 years old I find it sad that those who are often younger and more physically able than myself choose the motor driven group ascent. I told nobody where I was heading and left no messages, no insurance, simply know my limits and trust in luck. The journey back would at least start with a downhill section but as I descended to 120 metres above sea level all points of reference had gone, now I must simply keep Muirneag at my back and trust the rising ground to bring the North Tolsta turbine into view. Keeping this 30 degrees to my right would lead me home. Insect life is plentiful out here and while the small heath butterfly makes its uncertain airborne progress so I trudge on. I would never normally attempt this walk with such light footwear but my trainers have remained dry as the moor is baked to a crisp with no rain for two months. Around the reduced lochs and lochans the undercut blanket peat shrinks and crumbles away in great slabs and the sphagnum mossy hollows once lush green have dried a crisp sun-bleached ochre.

 Long-leaved Sundews flower in profusion lending a crimson sparkle to the purple of bell heather against the soft opaque green of lichen. This is the land of tweed and as I crunch my way back to my studio I wonder just how long the round trip will have been. As usual I discover that all this has not taken as long as I thought, just four and a half hours and so my sights are now set on the Heritage trail up the coast to Ness.