Catching Up

Stones on this day were white from the bright sun!

Well, it was Day 15 on Friday 20 July and so much has happened inside the Art Hut, or Artacabin at the Ness of Brodgar http://www.nessofbrodgar.co.uk/  I think I just have to post the photos and then tell about them to get you caught up. 

On these recent sunny days, it has been hard to be inside the Artacabin, but I am aware of time ticking away and the need for time to let oil paint dry properly. I have started working my paint sticks on the wall of Structure 12.  This curve within a more angular cut into the land attracted me.  Then, I recalled that it was on Structure 12 I first troweled in 2011.  I didn’t last too long at the troweling as a bad back problem,( no really, it was a matter of the youthful 26 year old on the inside meeting up with the outer body aged over 50) that put me into the small finds hut back then.  BUT before I left my troweling days behind, there were few stones visible at Structure 12.

Begining the southern edge of Structure 12

It should be all water above the green grass…but I may have to add some land on the other side to make it believeable.  My intent is not to create a realistic image but rather to have the reality be expressed as a passionate response in a painterly way.  To that end, this long painting will be composed of parts of the excavation that drew me in for a closer and longer look.  I hope it will reflect pieces of a whole place, marking the ground I stood on during the first two weeks at the Ness of Brodgar excavation.

Rounding the corner but with a much greater distance than I paint it to be, there is an entrance flanked by two flat stones. Just before them are these marked in plastic white and red tape triangle stones.

This was a big week.  My birthday was on Monday and American Boy Scouts from the east coast of the USA visited Orkney.  I was struck by how known Orkney is becoming if it becomes a destination for a Boy Scout group.  Ok, there was an international jamboree in Scotland anyway, but the addition of Orkney took effort!  Interestingly, they do allow members to have piercings and coloured hair.  This is not the Boy Scouts of my younger years and I am glad to see they have adopted 2018 trends!

Pat Long’s family has a long history with things at the Ness and other old Orkney things.

I never tire of holding old things.  Pat Long(nee Leith) has a long family history with Stenness and thus the standing stones just along from their farm.  It is no wonder they have a small collection of wonder and it is great that Pat came to share it with me.  It did feel funny holding a Neolithic ax head in front of my 2018 painting.