I was in Ayr in June, delivering my work, HOPE to narture cic (see below). The connection came about through an exchange of messages on social media. The connection grew stronger as things unfolded and my own familiarity with Ayr became apparent …
My late father, Alexander (Alec) was born and grew up in Muirkirk in Ayrshire and I spent many days as a child on the beach at Ayr with him, my Mum and siblings during our regular trips to visit family. As a result, Ayr has always remained a place close to my heart and so I’m particularly pleased to be able to take my work there.
The work HOPE is a tribute to a much loved Dad – a principled man who believed in and strived for a fairer society. He had an optimistic outlook on life and always saw the best in people.
I created the work during lock down, at a time when the theme of hope had a poignant universal meaning. It’s what got so many of us through each day over the COVID-19 pandemic and for me, personally, creating HOPE proved cathartic and a welcome distraction from news report after news report, bringing devastating statistics of daily deaths from COVID, both in the UK and the world at large.
I’m especially pleased for the work to be shown within the realms of narture cic, an artist collective, set up in 2020, by father and daughter team Robert and Saskia Singer, with the aim of supporting inclusion and community cohesion within Ayr. Narture is a welcoming organisation with hope at its core, alongside a strong commitment to nurturing the arts, respecting nature and making creativity accessible to everyone. If you’re in the Ayr area on September 2nd, there’s an open day of the narture studios – there’s a lot going on in this space (and you can even leave your own message of hope alongside my work!) Further details of this and other narture events can be found here: https://www.narture.co.uk/
