Light and landscape, weather and sea: these have been inspiring people in Orkney to create, as archaeology tells, back into times before stories were written down.
These elements make up part of what still inspires the work of artists, designers, and craftspeople whose work you find along the Creative Orkney Trail.
Ancient stones and present day wind turbines, steep coastlines and gentle hills, deep sea life and high flying birds, welcoming communities and solitary, uninhabited islands: Orkney can be a place of contrasts.
Those contrasts inspire creativity as well. Many of the visual artists who draw ideas and inspiration for these contrasts have joined up the Creative Orkney Trail to welcome visitors to their studios as a way to share their work in the islands and beyond.
Orkney itself is a group of about seventy islands off the far north coast of Scotland. Its southernmost point lies north of Caithness at the top of Scotland. The island group stretches more than fifty miles northward from there.
Orkney isn’t remote — by air an hour or so from Glasgow or Edinburgh, less than that from Aberdeen and inverness, a short ferry trip across the Pentland Firth from Thurso or six hours throught he North Sea by ferry from Aberdeen.
Nordic seafarers in the long ago found places to stop and stay in these islands. Orkney was governed under the crown of Norway, Denmark, and Sweden until the middle of the fifteenth century, when it was pledged as part of the marriage agreement between Margaret of Norway and James III of Scotland.
Nordic history as well as that of more ancient residents who made the Ring of Brodgar and Skara Brae are also sources of inspiration of the artists whose studios form part of the Creative Orkney Trail.
As you travel the Orkney Creative Trail, you can visit studios of painters, potters, weavers, jewelry makers, photographers, those who work in wood, and those who combine these arts. Many are award winning professionals with years of training and top level creative activity.
This promotional video from Orkney.com will give an idea…and let you hear an Orcadian accent from the narrator as well.
There are Creative Orkney Trail maps and guides in a brochure letting you know who’ll be open when and how to reach the studios. There are also chances to see some work in the main towns of the islands and elsewhere — more about all that later on.
First, though, a bit about several of the artists who are part of the Orkney Craft Trail.
Celina Rupp bases her jewelry making (and the cafe she’s recently opened alongside) in Holm, where her studio is near Scapa Flow. Her work includes images of landscape, nature, wildlife, and history. Her aim is to pass the inspiration these give her on to others through her work.
Hume Sweet Hume, based on Westray, the northernmost island of Orkney, creates in fabric. What began when sisters Lizza and Jenna Hume put their art studies to work making cushions and throws at the their kitchen tables now offer employment to other skilled fabric crafters in this northern island as their creations are sold worldwide through the web, and in shop in Kirkwall run by Lizza’s daughters Aileen and Megan.
Bill MacArthur had several adventures before settling on the island of Sanday: a degree in art in Edinburgh, work in advertising, running ang screen printing business, drawing political cartoons for newspapers, twenty years working at sea around the Northern and Western Isles on his own fishing boat.
All of these inform the images he creates in his paintings at his studio Gallery in the Northwa’.
Aurora is a team of silversmiths headed up by Steven Cooper. They create designs featuring Orkney’s nature and history and special collections including one featuring the Tall Ships and, in collaboration with Sony Pictires, a range based on the popular series Outlander. Steven’s studio along the Creative Orkney Trail is near the Scapa Flow.
Sheila Fleet is a jewelry designer with professional background in art and design including time in Edinburgh and London. After relocating back to her native Orkney she eventually decided to go out on her own, which she did at first by selling her creations from her front porch.
These days there is a workshop and gallery in Tankerness and a gallery in Kirkwall along the Creative Orkney Trail, as well as Sheila Fleet galleries in Edinburgh, Glasgow, and Fife.
Light, shape, and color are the mainstays of Robin Palmer’s work at Robin Palmer Ceramics,which you will in Orkney’s main town, Kirkwall Those interests come through especially in his lanterns and other lighting fixtures.
Andrew J. Appleby creates pottery and trains apprentices in doing so at the memorably named Harray Potter Ltd in Harray. When he is not doing those things he also writes writes the Skara series of Neolithic Noir novels.
David Pierce creates both wood sculpture and oil paintings at his Woodwick Gallery in Evie. The paintings often features Orkney’s historic buildings, while the sculptures are of animals and birds.
There are many more artists along Orkney’s Creative Trail, and as artists decide to hold open studio hours, new members join in, too. Several of the Creative Orkney Trail members also run shops where work of other artists is sold alongside their own.
Most Creative Orkney Trail members have websites, and many will ship internationally.
Whether you are seeking out directions to an artist’s studio or to a website, the Creative Orkney Trail guide can point your way. You may download this at the Creative Orkney website, and find printed copies at many places on the islands.
Visual art is not the only creative aspect of Orkney. As you travel along the Creative Orkney Trail in the road or online, here’s a bit of music from Orkney musicians singer and songwriter Kris Drever
and the band Fara to go along with your travels
Thanks to Creative Orkney and Scotland’s Trade Fair events in Glasgow for keeping me up with Creative Orkney Trail artists at times when I’ve not been able to be in the islands. Images here, from the Creative Orkney Trail Guide 2023.
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