St Andrew’s Cathedral, Inverness, until 2 February 2008

Presence by Karen Rann

“PRESENCE”, the culmination of Karen Rann’s residency as part of “The Other Side of Air – Arts & Spirituality” project, feels very much at home in the interior of St Andrew’s Cathedral. Suspended in space as if emanating from the natural architectural and spiritual focus of the building the eye is lead towards the altar by a series of origami sculptures. Wire suspension supports the many “parts of presence, attached together in 6’s like “snowflakes (or) molecules”.

Each section is comprised of individual “snapdragons” or “fortune tellers” and within these messages of love, thanks, remembrance and acknowledgement have been written by those who have worked with the artist as part of her residency. It is a communal work of good wishes and human connections both near and far.

The apex of the structure is comprised of white sculptures, giving the work an aspirational quality, while the interior and exterior of each “fortune teller” has been designed in warm and cool colours to suggest the physical and emotional aspect “inside” and “outside”. The artist worked with local schools, community groups, the Ness Bank Church, St Mary’s Church and St Andrew’s Cathedral to produce each component of the work and design the form of the flat and folded origami sections.

Although interaction with the piece is invited (the viewer is encouraged to unfold and read the messages) this does feel slightly invasive. Many of these wishes are deeply personal and emotive, even though they are built into a floating pyramid of public art. The way in which a kind of communal consciousness is suggested here is especially interesting, similar to the traditional function of church and congregation.

Individual thoughts, prayers and wishes become a collective statement, although this is not bound to any one faith in spite of the setting. The relationship between Art & Spirituality in the modern world certainly begs further exploration.

Complimentary to Rann’s installation within the Cathedral, Fin Macrae has created a fascinating series of images that form part of the entrance screens to the building. Originally conceived as a series of diptychs “Thought, Word and Deed” is cleverly integrated on site, presented here as two triptychs back to back and framed by the Gothic tracery of the screened entrance.

The trinity of the sequence balances the composition extremely well, adding to the visual impact of each work as a whole. There is also the context of illumination connected with the architecture, the way the work is framed as a reflection of the interior “stained glass (and) Russian icons on the wall of the North aisle of the Cathedral.”

Both inner and outer triptychs function beautifully in relation to each other in an exploration of public face and inner feeling. The concept of judgement on a personal level is powerfully evoked by the bleeding hand of the inner screen which seems eternally bound to that which we see on the outer entrance panel.

Although we cannot see the whole figure the neatly squared white manicured nails, arm dressed reverently in black and white rose ring which reads like a band of faith, suggests an outward state of being linked to the physical location of the image. It also implies a social and religious order which in the context of the whole sequence of images potentially offers “protection or isolation.”

Progression to the mid-section, leading the eye in the same way that we move physically inside the building from a secular world to a sacred space, focuses our attention visually on the “word” through printed text. This feeling is magnified physically and emotionally by the mid panel of the interior triptych.

In a similar way panel three on the exterior becomes an image of interior devotion through the focus on the altarpiece of the inner screen. The use of images of St Mary’s Chapel in Orkney, built by Italian POW’s during WWII, also implies another “outer” state of being and the protection of faith whilst in a state of cultural isolation.

What is so fascinating about this series is not just the exploration of theme echoed in I Samuel 16 v 7 (“The Lord does not look at things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance – but the Lord looks at the heart”), but that this principal is manifest in the artist’s actual approach to his practice.

The spontaneity and surface appearance we often equate with photography, especially in a world which bombards us incessantly with images, is never passively recorded by Macrae but actively explored and challenged on many levels. It is this capacity to really engage with the Art of Photography and with the contradictory nature of human perception that is such a strength in this artist’s work. Here this natural creative tendency is perfectly matched to the theme of the whole project.

Recently published in the 50th Anniversary Edition of “Ag – The International Journal of photographic Art and Practice”, MacRae’s work consistently presents a compelling dialogue between artist, camera and subject. To what degree we reveal an image or ourselves is explored in this latest work on multiple levels.

Ironically it is not the artist in residence giving the theme a public showing that has resounding “presence”, but the “thought, word and deed” of a resident artist.

“Presence” and “Thought, Word & Deed” is open for public viewing daily from 7.30am-6.15pm at St Andrew’s Cathedral and 5pm -7pm at Ness Bank Church

© Georgina Coburn, 2008

Links

• Karen Rann
• Finn Macrae
• Other Side of Air