Creative Connections Booklet by An Lanntair

Creative Connections

Fàilte “Lockdown was a tough time for a lot of people, especially for those living in remote rural areas. The Inspiring Scotland Creative Communities funding came at the right time. An Lanntair was able to arrange weekly online workshops for people over the age of 60 to chat with others, learn new skills and make art together. The artists who taught the sessions were brilliant at sharing their skills and unique ways of seeing. The project has been very beneficial to the people who took part, enabling them to connect with others in their community during the pandemic; reducing isolation and promoting the positive mental health benefits of creativity. We hope to continue to build this online creative community through many more workshops. This booklet gives an overview of only a few of the beautiful and thoughtful artworks created through the project.” Moira Macdonald ED UC A T IO N AND O U TRE ACH PRO J E CTS M A NA G E R , A N LANNTAI R

“Creative Communities is all about supporting people to enjoy the benefits of creative activity within their own communities. We know how this can really help with people’s wellbeing and mental health and we found this to be even more true during lockdown. It has been wonderful to see the amazing range of creative work from An Lanntair’s Creative Connections project supporting older people in the Western Isles and hear how this provided a creative focus and conversation for people struggling with isolation.” Erica Judge PE R F O R M A NC E A D V IS O R FO R CR E A TI V E C O M M U NIT IE S , I N S PI R I N G S C OT L A ND

“When helping compile this book I took a trip around Lewis and Harris, visiting all those who have generously contributed their work. The distances involved on these journeys reminded me of how easily remote living can become isolation. From my encounters it became clear how Creative Connections had helped alleviate some of the stresses of isolation. I was particularly struck by the generosity of spirit with all those I met. Connections had been made and friendships formed.” Mark Jones CR E A TI V E C O NN EC T IO N S PRO J E CT CO-O R DI NA T O R , A N L A NNTAI R

“It was great to meet others from across the islands with similar interests. Everyone was generous and supportive.”

Christina Riley THE B EACH TODAY

Christina Riley is an artist based on Scotland’s west coast. Inspired by the essential connections between art, literature and science, her work uses photography, found objects, writing and installations to draw attention to the details of the natural world with a particular focus on the edge of the sea. She has presented solo and group exhibitions across Scotland and in 2019 was longlisted for the Nan Shepherd Prize for Nature Writing, before later that year starting The Nature Library. Her book The Beach Today was published by Guillemot Press in 2021. During her series of online workshops, Christina encouraged participants to arrange and photograph found objects from daily walks. They also experimented with the process of Cyanotype, making images on light sensitive papers. www.thenaturelibrary.com 8

Gill Thompson PRI NTM AKI NG

Gill Thompson is an artist and printmaker based in Back, Isle of Lewis. She studied scenic art and design in the United States at the University of North Carolina and completed a UEI course in Art and Design and a Fine Art Printmaking degree module at Hereford College of Art. Gill taught at Primary school level where she became a Head Teacher and Special Educational Needs teacher. She also taught degree modules for teacher training and in-service training for teaching support assistants, and she worked with students creating set designs and doing set painting for student productions in the Theatre Studies department. Through Introduction to Printmaking online courses, Gill inspired participants to experiment with relief block printing, Gelli plate mono-printing, collage and making books. 9

Kate Temple HOME IS WHERE THE ART IS

Kate Temple is a visual artist based just outside Edinburgh. She works in various media including drawing, painting, sculpture and ceramics. She also works in community engagement, leading and facilitating art projects for a wide range of groups and individuals. Finding and collecting objects is a regular element of Kate’s practice. During lockdown she worked on a series of plant-inspired drawings and paintings and started to make her own inks from locally foraged materials. Kate’s Creative Connections drawing workshops focused on taking inspiration from our homes. Her classes experimented with household materials and objects, with things found and collected, to create experimental drawings and celebrate the domestic environment. 10

Pieter Van der Werf I NS PIRI NG TEXTI LES

Pieter van der Werf is a Dutch textile designer and visual artist based in Argyll and Bute. Working under the name Orains (Gaelic for the colour orange) he designs and makes large-scale textile art with local Scottish sheep wool he sources direct from the farmers close to his studio in Colintraive. Old felting techniques are applied to create contemporary wall pieces, rugs and fabrics. He’s interested in different sheep breeds, different wool fibres, different ways of handling these and the different way natural dyes ‘cling’ to the fibre. His work is informed and heavily influenced by the land we live on, by the sheep that graze the hill-farms, by the farmers who make a living rearing the sheep.

In his online workshops, Pieter taught participants the process of wet-felting for the purpose of creating wall-hangings. Pieter provided wool from Scottish Blackface and Jacob sheep sourced from farms close to the studio in Colintraive. He also led his class on a virtual botanical walk along the shores of Loch Riddon to discover the plant materials used to dye the wool for the studio. 11

Annabel Pattulo MEMO RY ON FABRI C

Annabel Pattulo is a Scottish artist living in Freiburg, Germany. She creates textile objects, wall hangings and art cards in her studio. Textiles are her passion and she loves working with different fabrics, printing and sewing. Annabel’s pieces combine imagery, photographs, drawings and writing, which she transfers onto cloth with transfer foil, also printing, mono-printing and screen printing. Finally, she layers and collages fabrics, incorporating stitch and embroidery, revealing and concealing elements of the design. Annabel has a degree in Art & Design, specialising in Textiles & Surface Decoration from Gray’s School of Art in Aberdeen. She worked as an art tutor with the Arts Development Team at Aberdeen City Council and has led more than 15 community textile projects with different groups. She loves using her creative skills to build relationships and support others.

Anabel said: “I really enjoyed being involved with Creative Connections and looked forward to the weekly online sessions. I had a lovely group, and the atmosphere was relaxed and fun from the first session. It was very satisfying to see confidence growing week by week and witness the sense of achievement that the participants got from their finished Memory Books. I would love to see the Memory Books in person and hope to visit Lewis and Harris in the future.” www.annabelskunstatelier.com

Sandra Kennedy RANNSACHADH EA LAI N LÈIRSI NN EACH AGUS BOGSAICHEAN SGEULACHD

Sandra Kennedy is an artist from Lewis. She studied sculpture and scenography (visual storytelling through performance). Sandra’s work is inspired by people and their relationship to places, and is especially interested in emotional attachment and stories connected with specific locations and sites. Sandra works from her home in Marvig, South Lochs. Sandra did the online series ‘Rannsachadh ealain lèirsinneach’ which included experimental drawing and painting. When Covid restrictions eased, she led ‘Bogsaichean sgeulachd’ in Grinneabhat Centre in Bragar. The participants shared stories about themselves and their community. Inspired by the work of Joseph Cornell, they made assemblages of drawings, writing, photographs and objects in box frames. 13

“It taught me to look at things a different way. From everyday objects to the colours in the garden outside. This was so uplifting.” 15

Adele

“I met a lot of new people... really friendly... enjoyed it and learned a new skill.”

Agnes

“...there was always the two to three o’clock on a Friday to look forward to... gathering all the utensils and the materials we needed for that week’s theme... and the anticipation of seeing those friends again.”

Barbara “...and the thing that was really quite overwhelming at some point for me... two courses... in the felting one and the memory book one, I actually connected with craft techniques what I had done about 30 years ago.”

Fiona “It’s just altered, I think, the way I view things, which has made a huge difference.”

Karen

Gisela

“I basically went out every day, I didn’t mind the weather, to take a kind of recording of what was on the beach.”

Maureen

Mari

Mairi “I live alone here and I haven’t seen anybody... it’s been a whole new level of solitude. So it’s just came along at the right time.”

Kirsty

“It was really nice making connections with these people just for that time while we were in the class because everybody had something to share.”

Philly

“I made some physical connections as well as virtual ones, which is great.”

Pippa

“I’m not an artist, I don’t think, but I can play about with materials and make something and look back at it and go, wow, I did that.”

“The weekly sessions were something to look forward to amid the dreariness of lockdown. I don’t know how I would have coped passing the time without this weekly focus.” 32

Bogsaichean Sgeulachd

Bha seo na bhùth-obrach sònraichte dhomh, ag obair le triùir bhoireannach mìorbhuileach a tha a’ fuireach gu h-ionadail. B’ e seo a’ chiad bhùth-obrach a rinn mi aghaidh-ri-aghaidh bho ghlasadh am pandemic agus ann an àite ùr. Bha an t-àite-obrach air leth freagarrach agus cha b’ urrainn an taic agus an fhàilte chridheil a fhuair sinn bho ionad Ghrinnebhat a bhith na b’ fheàrr. Bha am bùth-obrach stèidhichte air sgeulachdan agus na nithean a tha a’ buntainn riutha. Bha an obair-ealain air a bhrosnachadh agus na ùmhlachd do obair Iòsaph Chornell. Ruith a’ bhuidheann seo sa bhad leis na beachdan sin agus bha còmhraidhean mìorbhaileach aca mun ghaol a th’ aca air na bailtean, an cànan agus na daoine aca, agus tha na ceanglaichean sin air an sealltainn gu brèagha anns na h-obraichean a rinn iad. Sandra Kennedy 34

“I live on my own and it was really good to speak to other people with the same interests and sense of purpose.”