Caroline and Ray are hooked on all things to do with the sea. It is a great source of inspiration for their art and is a wonderful therapy. Both are wild swimmers who can often be seen playing in the water at Eye Cave, East Beach and Belhaven Bay. They hope that this exhibition captures some of the magic that they experience in their encounters with the Sea, it’s creatures and in Nature more generally. Caroline says…
The artwork included in this exhibition has all been made during the pandemic. I am a trained Art Therapist and these works have been an important part of how I have processed my own identity and found some escape from anxiety in this challenging time. The images are a part of the process of my own personal therapy and so are very meaningful for me. They also reflect how important connecting with nature through sea swimming has been in all this process. These images mark a big change in the way I make artwork. A reconnecting with myself. An immersion in the creative process. They have helped me learn about marine life and about myself. My active interest in large marine creatures began about 25 years ago, at a New Year trip to Arran when a friend mentioned that basking sharks could be seen from there in summer. Since then I have travelled all around Scotland’s Hebridean Islands, to Orkney, Shetland and eventually to Arctic Norway looking for whales, dolphins and basking sharks. I have yet to see a basking shark. Some of the images reflected ceteceans and marine mammals that were visiting our shores, sighted around Scotland. This led on to a sort of wish list through the act of drawing and painting. Creatures I would wish to see. During this time a humpback whale came to the Firth of Forth and I was able to see it several times, sharing the experience with my children, both from shore and on a boat trip. This was very meaningful. I was able to share the artwork through an online exhibition during lockdown, but it seems to me that it is very different seeing artwork in person. Much the same as meeting people online is just not the same, it feels important to me to share the artwork so it can be seen up close. Artwork is rather difficult to photograph, I have learned. The light changes the colours. The variation of lines and textures get lost. The richness of surfaces does not translate easily when reproduced. So it has felt important to share these works in a gallery space. Ray says… During the Pandemic I found it very difficult to create art. All I wanted to do was to go walking in nature and swimming in the sea. The urge to create never left me and I continued drawing but, somehow, I didn’t have the desire to set myself up to take it any further. Last year, I decided to join a watercolour painting class with my original teacher Sheena Phillips. I also joined a printmaking class. Painting and Printmaking are two strands of media that have run through my artistic career, and I felt very happy to be making contact with them again. Nature has always been a great inspiration in my art and I feel blessed to have the inspiration of the beautiful countryside and coastline of East Lothian nearby.