There are places in the world where the landscape takes your breath away and that is enough to inspire an experienced artist. Sometime there is a place that is so much more than what is on the surface of the landscape. Orkney, Scotland is that type of place.
It has been attracting well known artists from the south for years. Many English artists have relocated their studios to these northern isles and the native Orcadians have been having their artistic endeavours carried south. At least 4 of the major silver jewelry manufacturers for the whole of Scotland began in Orkney. You will see their wares in Glasgow, Edinburgh, London, and here in the USA at Scottish or Celtic games.
Most important to me, is the wealth of Neolithic sites including the standing stones that are the oldest in Britain. The recent finds near StoneHenge are a direct reflection on the older sites in Orkney. SkaraBrae and WoodHenge have the same housing floor plan.
So..go to the source. Learn the history of the land that the people walked and worked with. Orkney is a place where you can easily clamber down prehistoric steps, bend over find yourself staring at the grafetti that the Vikings left. Attend the many festivals from the judging of the local beer, to the Folk Festival where the fiddle playing flies to visiting the numerous summer county shows where the local dogs, goats, chickens, cattle, and eggs are judged.
This year, May has been declared HomeComing 2007.Folks with Orkney in their roots are being encouraged to return to those roots. Many native peoples from Canada are coming to see the roots of their relatives employed by the Hudson Bay Company so many years ago. The employees that made this fur trapping company successful 100 years ago, were the Orcadians who proved to be both adaptable and resourceful. They married with the local folk and started new lives.
But the Orcadians value the history of the land and the people who have lived with the land and the sea and they are curious. Picking a place, like Orkney to stay on awhile lets you become a little bit more a part of that landscape. Looking for a week that has a theme of exploration to it will get you to know the
people in way you might not otherwise have done. Orkney Arts Adventure offers a week of cultural immersion experiences in small groups. In the afternoons, the small group receives supplies and in a printmaking technique that reflects the same joy of discovery they have had during their daily visits to
local sites.
If the city is more your desire, rather than the windswept fields and curves of a Scottish island, than Glasgow is your spot. High on a hill in the "uptown" area of Glasgow is the Glasgow School of Art, designed by Charles Renni MacIntosh. You can take a summer art class their offered directly by the school, or attend one being organized by the Tyler School of Art, Pennsylvannia and you will get to paint in the same studio that has been home to artists since the architect walked its halls as it was being built. You will tell time by the original wall clocks that MacIntosh also designed. Perhaps you will be lucky enough to have an easel that also has the touch of MacIntosh.
Charles Renni MacIntosh is the hero of Glasgow. You can spend 3 days checking out all the buildings and interiors he is responsible for!. This will take you to churches, schools and a fine estate home in the outskirts of Glasgow. You will find contemporary jewelry being made in his style and marquees written in the distinctive font he designed. Enjoy lunch sitting in a reproduction of one of the high back chairs he designed for the two current tea rooms you can visit. You just how much the simplest food tastes grand when the surrounding atmosphere is so 1915.
The Kelvingrove Art Museum which reopened this year after extensive renovations, houses outstanding examples of his work. You can also see the original interior of the house he and his wife Margaret MacDonald (one of the original Glasgow Girl artists) designed and lived in at the Glasgow University Hunterian Museum.
You will see why Frank Lloyd Wright is the product of all the good things he saw..for MacIntosh is one of his influences, without a doubt but you will have seem, felt and tasted the "Wright" source!.
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