Islanders’ exhibition inspired by landscapes

Visitors to Da Gadderie at Shetland Museum will have an opportunity to enjoy the work of five painters from Shetland and Orkney from 17th May.

Paul Bloomer, Ruth Brownlee and Gail Harvey all share with Orcadians Diana Leslie and Laura Drever, a deep fascination with our island landscape. Although the exhibition will be united by a common theme, the response of each of the artists is unique and deeply personal.

Bloomer would not describe himself as a landscape painter, yet nature plays a highly significant role in his work. When working from landscape he paints outdoors, responding to the light, the weather and the seasons without attempting in any way to describe the immediate topography.

Leslie also works within the landscape, and in all weathers, but focusing on those objects which frame and stabilise her vision.

Drever and Brownlee are studio-based painters, giving form and life to memories of landscapes they have previously explored and come to know.

Harvey’s paintings evoke Shetland’s weather, its skies and seas. She makes no attempt to describe place, yet her works conjure a powerful sense of the drama and light of Shetland’s West Mainland.

Curated by the Hansel Co-operative, which has over the past decade published work by many Shetland and Orcadian writers, the exhibition will run until 29th June.

The exhibition organiser John Hunter said: “After the <i>Writing the North</i> literature exhibition Da Gadderie continues the theme of links between Orkney and Shetland.

“These artists were especially invited to exhibit together to give an insight into their individual interpretations of the same themes.

“What’s highlighted in this exhibition is that there are limitless ways to see your surroundings and countless modes of expressing ideas generated by a common source.

“Landscapes are rarely passive and much of the painting in this show is animated, active, restless and rich in colour.”