Some of the words on the scrolls and dismantling

 I did a fair bit of research from the museum, from archives and books trying to work out some of the things that folk may have had in their homes in the Highlands around the 1820s.

The idea of the scrolls is that they form a kind of household inventory; lists of all the things that might have been in a home, that needed to be gathered, collected and packed up when folk were forced to leave.  There is a lot when you think about it.

I have included on the inventories some old Scots words which are unfamiliar to us today. I thought it might be important to also have a list of them to help people interpret the work more fully.

Some of these include:

Simmons - a rope

Flate - a straw partition

Rantle Tree - a pivoting iron bar above a fire

Creepy - a stool for children

Caff-seck - mattress ticking filled with chaff

Bosom - a brush or a broom

Kist - a chest

And yes, the stitching goes on...

Part 2...

As part of our recent photography Pop-Up show Exposed, Sheila and I chose to re-furbish and re-purpose the frames. Barry painted a number of them black, we removed old artworks, cleaned up the tape and glue residues, replaced the foam core and put in hangers.

And thus some artworks have been dismantled. I quite like what this one is becoming - lots of interesting moments appearing.

I can't find a decent photo of it anywhere - here is its sibling back in 2011...

Here it is out of the frame (which got used for one of the Exposed images). I began lifting the rusted paper which had drawing marks on it - travel lines and such - but some of it remained, which I quite liked.

And then I chopped the work up into 4 page-sized pieces, and played around with arrangements.

But also thought they might provide the beginnings of 4 new mini artworks

And that somehow the centre could be used on one of them; or become the beginnings of another piece entirely.

I love the process of re-imagining something; creating new possibilities out of old and worn work. 

we shall see where this goes, but for now it shows promise!