Walk / Don’t Walk

It has been a while since the last post—blame it on the lengthening days, the pull of the green world over the white screen come evening—but in it I want to talk about a couple of the walks I’ve taken over the Spring and early Summer, in which I have been seeking something particular. What I’ve been homing in on are works of art in the landscape: textured, and textual creations, repositories of meaning and touchstones for new experiences. This piece is a way of thinking through some of the ideas which have arisen.

Encountering an artwork in a landscape, particularly a relatively remote one, is an estranging experience. One expects overgrown sheep fanks, leaning dykes, the traces of former habitation. This is literally part of the territory, especially where I live in Dumfries and Galloway. What one does not expect (even when one is seeking it—I’ll explain later)…