Hoy Heritage Centre – Friends of Hoy Kirk

This project has been an amazing chance to explore printmaking without the restrictions of space and travel. The award has aided me in buying essential printmaking materials such as rollers and inks, as well as setting up my home studio space.

The project aimed to collect, research and share Orkney family legends about surnames and place names. These aims were all achieved.

The project collected 226 legends in a database (including some variants of the same story). These were drawn from both oral and written sources: Interviews with Orkney people, oral history audio archives at Orkney Archive and School of Scottish Studies, published books (e.g. George Marwick Yesnaby’s Master Storyteller), pamphlets (e.g. produced by heritage groups and projects), magazines (e.g. Sib Folk News) and websites.

Actual audience figures for the film screening were nearly 50% higher than forecast, and a 4.75/5 ping-pongometer score (our audience feedback system) was our highest for many years.

Our invited director Eva Charlotte Nilsen travelled with her husband and both were invited to be guests of honour for Norwegian Constitution Day on May 17th. Eva gave a speech outside St Magnus Cathedral and her husband Erik Bugge gave a speech at the dinner reception in the evening. This was a nice positive outcome which wasn't forecast and made their visit extra special.

My award was used to fund a research trip to the exhibition ‘Sheila Hicks: Off Grid’ at the Hepworth Wakefield in West Yorkshire. This took place in early August of 2022. The experience of seeing ‘in the flesh’ works by an artist I have long admired en masse and on hugely varied scale was moving and significant in a lasting way, both personally and professionally, and several months on is still returning to me in unexpected moments.

It is impossible to replicate the experience of seeing works which are as deeply physical as Hicks’ in reality and it is an opportunity I am very grateful for.