Tag: history

Snapshots & Sketches – I love this town!

Art Projects

Community engagement as a radical act: local children, sharing history, Inverkeithing’s community garden and beloved woodland. Conceptual art about witch trials…

Ian Walker

featured image: Janus interpretation of Ian’s work.

Ian’s work is probably the most varied in interests of all of the artists, and he was certainly one of the most prolific. What emerges is a kind of radical enthusiasm for the ideas of community life and local resource management. Ian has been involved with the Inverkeithing Community Garden since its onset, a beautiful space which offers peace and beauty to visitors, as well as a deeply satisfying activity for people who get involved with gardening and managing it. Ian has a general love for wildlife, especially trees, and he was drawn to illustrating the trees of the area. If we come to value trees, and especially trees within complex eco systems, as we really should, then Ian’s work looks like portraiture of individuals, as much as just ‘drawings of trees’. Each is recognisable to someone who knows and them lives with them every day.

Ian’s other genius is for including passers by into his work, and the project of Inverkeithing in general. When out and about drawing or doing his other art works, he not only talks to people who express an interest, but documents them in the form of photography, and later develops this further into his work.

Ian was also fascinated by the horrific crimes against the people who were tried for witchcraft in the 17th Century in Inverkeithing. He elevated his response to this with a remarkable piece of conceptual art in Witch Knowe Park, which is situated across from Witch Knowe, the place where the accused were tried and killed. He attached 51 scraps of colourful fabric, representing the number of people known so far to have died here in this way, to a small tree in the public park area. These scraps remained on the tree, to be encountered by walkers and visitors, creating a memorial. While attaching the scraps, he was approached by a little girl and her mum, interested in what he was doing, and he invited them to help. He of course recorded this with a photograph.

Ian is currently collaborating with Rosie Gibson on her Instagram ‘Idiot Wind’ project.

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Snapshots & Sketches – voices in stone and wood

Art Projects

Building an embodied town: experiences of Scottish tradesmen, tools and techniques for generations

Sandy Stephen

featured image: Janus interpretation of Sandy’s work

“There are many fine historic buildings in Inverkeithing. Some of these are named after the original owners such as Rosebury House and The Friary. In other parts of the country, houses are recognised as being the work of famous architects – Adam brothers – or as a reward for battles fought and won – Blenheim Palace – but as I studied the buildings and the methods used to build them I realised that those gems of construction are actually memorials to the multitudes of men and women who shaped and cut the stone and timber. Who worked long hours in often appalling conditions and so often to the detriment of their health. Who are forgotten and nameless. So when I see a tool mark or a particularly subtle piece of skill, I like to touch it and connect across the ages and thereby for a fleeting moment acknowledge and appreciate their skill and craftsmanship and even of their existence.”

Sandy Stephen, text for Snapshots & Sketches 2020

Sandy originally set off on the project drawing and painting the buildings of Inverkeithing, and as he looked at details, it was as if the countless number of nameless men who had physically built the town began to emerge from his pen! He filled a sketchbook with teeming details about building methods, tools and machinery, and even recreated tools from wood and other materials. But it was probably his paintings of the men working away which most readily illustrate his thinking. When Jane included the figures in her Janus interpretation for Sandy’s work, it began to take on the impression that the men were ‘building’ the head out of stone, like lilliputians creating a giant statue. This seems entirely fitting to his subject matter.

Snapshots & Sketches – girls and women + dangerous power

Art Projects

Remembering the unvoiced: Inverkeithing’s witch trials and the dangerous power of young woman

Emma Hurles, 13

featured image: Janus interpretation of Emma’s work

Emma and her mum Susan worked in tandem on the project, and both were immediately drawn to the Inverkeithing witch trials and murders. They researched the terrible events and created their own personalised memorial for the people who suffered. Their research and art work deliberately aims for the creation of a permanent memorial within the town, which has been done in so many other places in Scotland, as across England and the rest of Europe.

Emma explored her own interest in concepts of the occult, and modern day witchcraft as a marginal belief system. As a young girl she represents the disruptive power which causes women and minority groups to remain ‘othered’. The work of 13 year old Hope Francis also reflects this, especially with photographs which include unsettling self portraits, set within the environments of Inverkeithing.

Two of the other artists involved with the motif project, Donna Sinclair and Ian Walker, were also drawn to the accusations of witchcraft, and the torture and murder which occurred in Inverkeithing in the 17th Century. Interest in this subject waxes and wanes amongst artists and writers, but 2021 seems an auspicious time, perhaps particularly on the back of the Covid 19 pandemic, to bring these ideas forward and think about bringing them to fruition this year. Watch this space!

Snapshots & Sketches – healing hands

Art Projects

Making masks and the power of hands in a pandemic: across many generations of care, health and loss.

Esther Gray

featured image: Janus interpretation of Esther’s work.

When the project began, Esther was already busy making face coverings for her family and friends. As an experienced seamstress she had sourced a really nice design, with a good shape, a removable nose grip and removable internal layer. This attention to detail, and level of care, is a good indicator of how Esther tackles everything, including the motif project. She began the project by drawing her own hands, doing ‘women’s’ tasks such as sewing, and the hands of loved ones. For her, they represent care, but nands also resonated with the fear that Covid was spread through touch, and the health directives to socially distance from each other and to wash our hands frequently.

Esther’s other interests included the Friary Hospitium, extending her theme of care and care-takers. The Hospitium provided a stopping-off-point for people on religious pilgrimage to Dunfermline, and for other travellers. Behind the Friary buildings, the site of the current parks and community garden, there would have been kitchen and physic gardens, growing plants to provide food and for medicinal purposes. The Friary sits atop a hill running down to Inverkeithing bay and harbour, and one thinks of supplies perhaps being taken down to the people on docked plague ships. The Friary is also just within the old town walls, where plague camps would squat, people quarantining and waiting to be allowed in to the town. Would they have been provided food by the Friary?

Esther’s work developed towards a sensitive interpretation of living during the Covid19 pandemic. She was interested in the idea of ‘memento mori’ and the way in which, in many eras, people have had to live with high mortality as a daily lived reality.

Snapshots & Sketches – Inner Bay

Art Projects

Searching for the Lazaretto: Inner Bay, Pinkie Well and mud-skating across generations.

Karen Delaney

featured image: the Janus interpretation of Karen’s work

“The muddy surface (of Inner Bay) presents a wretched contrast to the scene when the tide has returned and is at its height. One day soon going home from school with bag on back, I turned up my trousers as far as they could go, and started across from the bottom of the manse garden in the direction of Pinkie well. When nearly halfway over my imagination became possessed by the idea of bogs and the bottomless pit; and it seemed the same if I tried to turn back or proceed. I kept on my way, and got out at ‘Pinkie’, and there washed my little shanks in the pool at which cows were watered, none the worse, and less disposed to repeat the feat.”

‘Reminiscences of childhood at Inverkeithing, or, Life at a Lazaretto’ 1882, by James Simpson, b1826

Karen Delaney ‘Dad skating across Inner Bay with his brother, Inverkeithing 1950s”

Karen was intrigued by ‘the Lazaretto book’ which can be read here , and in particular she explored the topography and geography of Inverkeithing’s bay, and the position of the buildings. She runs the local cafe, situated near the top of The Mill Brae, a pathway from the high street to the bay and harbour. Her work in the community, especially for older Inverkeithingers, is well known and appreciated.

Karen’s family are from the area, and she found a delightful parallel between the story of James’ fearful skate across the mud flats in the 1830s, and her dad and uncle’s stories of skating there in the 1950s.

Karen is also interested in locally produced food and foraging, and has a knowledge about local sites where wild plants can be collected.

Lainy Allison – Multi Talented Mixed Media

Events, Festive Makers Market 2015

Mixed-media artist Lainy Allison will be joining Inverkeithing Arts Initiative for the FESTIVE MAKERS MARKET this Saturday 12th December, 11AM – 4.30PM, Queen Street, Inverkeithing, KY11 1PA.

Lainy is the final artist in our line-up of makers who will be displaying and selling their beautiful work this Saturday in Inverkeithing, a fitting end to the list as both she and her work are so lovely! Lainy is proficient in a wide range of mixed media techniques and her work is much sought after and loved by admiring collectors. Her work and images are extracted from an array of influences, history, culture, architecture, family and nature.

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Seacycle – History of the Fife Coast

Events, Festive Makers Market 2015

_20151010_125344“After years of collecting pottery shards, coloured sea-glass, washed up slate and shells, I thought I would try my hand at making something out of it so that other people can have a little piece of history of the Fife Coast.”

Seacycle will be coming down the coast from the East Neuk to Inverkeithing for the INVERKEITHING FESTIVE MAKERS MARKET to show and sell her delightful decorative mosaics and carved sea slates – all with a fascinating history! See Faith on Saturday 12th December, 11AM – 4.30PM, Inverkeithing Civic Centre, Queen Street, KY11 1PA.

“There was always an abundance of sea china around the Kirkcaldy area, probably a result of the past history of many pottery works which sadly no longer exist. The earliest history of pottery recorded was about 1610. By the end of the 19th century there were four main potteries, Fife, Kirkcaldy, Rosslyn and Sinclairtown from around 1837-1932. They used a variety of techniques that made functional and decorative ceramics including hand-painting and sponge printing. Lots of the pieces I have found date back over 150 years verified by the finishing.”

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