Confluences
How individual drops of effort can, gathered up, become a powerful flow
One quiet morning last week I was drawn outside by a sudden noise that filled the sky above our house. A crescendo of raw honks, squeaky yaps and buzzing pinion feathers swelled and then subsided to a steady clamour. I stepped outside to see that a parliament of greylag geese had gathered to settle on the loch for a great honking debate…
It’s a real sign of the beginning of Autumn. Arriving from the north, the greylags come in skeins, ragged vees dark against the cloudy sky, skimming our chimneys as they tip the air from under their wings to splash down on the loch on big splayed feet.
The numbers of these geese have been increasing steadily in Orkney from just a few hundred in the 1980s to tens of thousands now, our resident birds joined by new arrivals from Iceland here for the winter. As winters get milder they no longer need to fly further south to find grazing.
The farmers hate them, flying herbivores, cows with wings, ruining pastures, raining shit on the fields and into the loch, leaving long greenish smears on our windows that we wait for the rain to wash off. The man from the water company, who comes to check the levels at the dam each week, tells me they think the bottom of the whole loch is now coated with their slurry. I worry about the bird flu they might bring with them to my hens.
But I still love their noisy company and clatter of wings through the the dank, frozen midwinter days to come.
It seems to me that Summer is a scattered time. Energy is dispersed like the sunlight that sparkles on the water. Visitors arrive from the ferry, bringing to our kitchen table their laughter, news from South, bottles of wine. The long, bright days call us outside. It’s far too nice to work! we complain. The light nights make it hard to sleep. Concentrated focus is elusive.
In contrast, Autumn feels like a time of gathering, of harvesting what has been quietly ripening, of settling in, of things coming together again. Even the birds gather, flocking up over the stubble fields and on the loch. Everything starts to feel a bit more collected, contained.
On the veg patch we’ve been harvesting, gathering tomatoes, onions, potatoes, courgettes, beans, kale, beetroot, leeks, carrots.
Meanwhile, in my studio, I’ve been getting ready for an exhibition at Northlight Gallery in Stromness that will gather together a series of my recent drawings.
“CONFLUENCE” is a solo exhibition that’s an exploration of drawing as both a solitary contemplative practice and as a shared activity that offers space for collaboration and conviviality.
Shaped by Orkney’s dynamic natural environment of wind, sky and particularly water, these drawings are an invitation to notice how water permeates everything. We all move between varying degrees of wetness in a world of water: sea, lake, stream, aquifer, cloud, mist, rain, fog, vapour, tears, sweat, piss, in a liquid reality that interpenetrates our own bodies and minds. Water is the element most visibly disrupted by the climate and environmental crisis. Increasing frequency of floods and persistent droughts, pollution, over-extraction, ocean acidification and melting glaciers all bring into question our exploitative relationship with this most vital of elements.
In contrast to the quick mutability of water, my own drawing process is a slow and meditative practice, a patient accretion of simple marks that results in intricate forms resembling sea foam, cloud forms or wave patterns. Drawing takes the brief moment of the hand’s movement and holds it still, recorded in the mark that remains. The slow, repetitive method I use makes each drawing a receptacle of time, a net that gathers up these moments so they are visible in a single instant that shows the timespan of the drawing’s own making.
I’m also inviting visitors to the gallery to join me in another kind of confluence, to co-create with me a giant drawing that captures our collected energy in a great wave or flow, made up of little white circles on a long roll of black paper.
I’ve made a small start already, with some help, and I love how it’s starting to feel like a slow incoming tide creeping inexorably across the paper. It will become, I hope, a visible metaphor for how each of our small individual actions can come together into something vast and powerful.
I don’t even know how long the roll of paper is (longer than my studio!) or how far we’ll get, but I’m looking forward to seeing the drawing grow over the two weeks the Northlight show is on, and I’ll probably keep it going for…who knows…a year? Two? Until we fill the whole roll of paper?
If you’re in Orkney between September 9th and 20th do come along to the gallery and draw a few circles! The preview is from 2pm to 4pm on Saturday 9th. Do come along if you can.
And if you’re not likely to be anywhere near Stromness you can see some more of my most recent drawings here.
But I’ll leave you with some more sights and sounds of an Orkney Autumn: sunset, coming earlier now, viewed from my canoe, a stray feather drifting past, geese gossiping, the neighbours’ dog barking at me from the opposite shore, tractors busy baling silage.
Wishing you calm Autumn sunsets and light on water,
Sam
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I meant to wish you every success with your exhibition when we spoke yesterday. ‘Confluence’ is such a great title - funnily enough I chose ‘Moments of Confluence’ for my my first solo exhibition. Inside from its connection with water, it talks of our relationship with the land, the light and the season. Then, also, in terms of how showing art brings us together as people; it’s an opportunity for dialogue, so it fits your exhibition well. I shall be watching for your updates eagerly.
Thank you too for recommending FLOW to your subscribers. It’s much appreciated.