The Flows And The Flora: New Works By Magi Sinclair
-
Overview
The Flows And The Flora
Magi Sinclair has spent almost a lifetime exploring this part of the Highlands and its unique landscape. An area she considers as home.
In 2024 the Flow Country was awarded Unesco World Heritage status, the first site on mainland Britain to do so. Now it seems everyone wants to know more about this fragile environment.
- Gordon BrownMy family have farmed in and around the same area of Latheron, Caithness for hundreds of years. The earliest mention of the farm name of Nottingham comes from the 12th century - Nottigan possibly Norse origin Nauta (cattle) and Engjar (meadow), around the same time the Sinclairs came to this area.
Growing up on the farm with brothers and sisters, we had the freedom to roam all over the farm, only going home when hunger drove us. A lot of what interests me stems from that childhood; places, animals, insects and the flora of the north. Farming was less mechanised, slower and there seemed to be more wildlife and wild flowers all over.
There were many fascinating things to look at and to explore - wild gardens with some exotic planting (for Caithness), a dam with swans and golden trout, all kinds of birds around, curlews with their mournful cry, lapwings - known as peewits from their call - and The Wag O’ Forse, an Iron Age settlement up on the hill.
I reference the play of light, wind, rain and ice on the pools, grasses curling likened to musical notes, plant shadows look like they are dancing on the water. The wide variety of plants and mosses with the cotton grasses waving and studding the land.-Artist Magi Sinclair
-
WorksTHE FLOWS AND THE FLORA
Wildlife in the form of birds, insects, lizards, beetles is all around and the midges and clegs drive visitors off the bogland. Only by sitting very quietly does it bring its rewards. I do a lot of observing. The Flows and the Flora is a culmination of all this observation. I am trying to convey a sense of being back there in that landscape, to capture the essence of the place. Local Caithness names are used as parts of titles for some of my work describing bogs, pools, plants, many words having long disappeared. History plays a part as do local authors, informing my work and how I think.
The piece ‘Tears for Triduana’is a reference to a Northern Saint called Triduana in the Ballachly/Munsary area. Legend has it that she plucked out her eyes to repel an unwanted suitor, she was famed for curing eye diseases. There is graveyard way out in the hills which would have been the site of a buried relic and a place of pilgrimage. The Flows may appear empty lands nowadays but long ago small settlements were situated in around these wetlands such as Badryrie near to the St. Triduana graveyard.
These are some of my inspirations for my art and an appreciation of coming from a special place.
by Magi Sinclair
For all purchases and enquires please email info@browns-gallery.com Please note all works are framed.
-
-
