39 Albert Street, Kirkwall, Orkney, until 9 December 2011

THREE very different artists have taken over an empty commercial premises in the middle of town and filled it with wildly contrasting work.

IT’S AN interesting show, not just aesthetically, but philosophically, because it nicely encapsulates the problem which has beset makers since medieval times – how to make a living out of what you do. The cathedral masons got  an assurance that they’d join the heavenly choir, and maybe the price of a pint if the gargoyles didn’t resemble anybody too closely; but as soon as art had earthly patrons, the problems began.

As John Berger points out so well in Ways of Seeing, the question should always be – who’s paying? Now that shopping centres, not kirks, are our holy spaces, the question’s an even bigger one.

Celia Clark - Winter Light II

These Orkney artists are dealing with the problem in their own ways. Britt Harcus runs a successful business. Her work is well know and loved locally. Her quirky, jolly cartoons are firmly rooted in the agricultural traditions she grew up in. There’s a confident brisk line, witty text, bouncy colour (her Horsey Wardrobe includes a carrot labelled ‘bribe’, for example).

Her calendars are eagerly sought after. She works from commission,  does book illustration, has a base in a large local store where you can see her at her sketchpad creating. It’s a no nonsense approach.

For the first time, to my shame, I saw her serious studies here, line drawings and painting; they’re downstairs, whilst the cartoon work is upstairs, perhaps to make a space between the two styles – but she herself sees all her work as a whole and doesn’t distinguish. Cartooning is a skilful business – one line awry and you’ve had it – just as skilled as the line you walk around a page when you’re meditating on the shape of a cow’s head.

A Britt Harcus hen

Two of her studies caught me – a cow suckling, which could have descended into whimsy but didn’t, and a young bull’s head, rearing out of the picture. In both, line is used with sensitivity – soft for the calf, tense and nervy for the bull calf. This variation in the direction of line, and even a developing delicacy in the shape, pressure and softness of pencil, is encouraging to see.

If Harcus can find the confidence she shows in her cartoons and hone her technique, she’ll become a considerable draughtsperson. There’s work to be done, to engage with the complexity of graphite – and extend, perhaps, into charcoal and pastel – but it’ll be fun and rewarding. In the meantime she knows she can make a living and give people much enjoyment from what she does.

Celia Clark’s work too is commercial – but different again. She’s a photographer who digitally reworks her images to create striking wall pieces. These are natural images – seaweeds, frozen water, trees, rocks, bones – which seem translated, caught in time. Often they have the look of specimens from a microscope, or snapshots from a dream sequence. They’re clean and clear, with vivid colour – though the piece I liked best, Rugged Edges, is in black and white and the more dramatic for it.

These are unframed, almost wrapped around a block, standing proud of the wall. They’re elegant, and the meditation on line which is crucial to graphic design of any sort is controlled by the process, so that you don’t have intimate contact with the artist’s hand – just her mind. In Harcus’ work, you can feel the woman behind, driving the line along; not here. There’s a scientific perfection which makes these works ideal for a modern wall.

Laura Drever - Birsay Whale Bone

Laura Drever illustrates the artist’s dilemma perfectly. Her collaborations with poets, resulting in pamphlets produced by local press Brae Editions – a translation of some Holderlin, and Ecstatics, about birds – line the windows of the gallery. Her Orkney Studies should, indeed, be studied by anybody perplexed by the point of a pencil. She has an attentive eye and a responsive hand, which results in delicacy, subtlety, versatility – a lesson in how to draw. In a county where everybody is drawing stones (believe me, I have seen more tragic renditions of standing stones than most…) you can do no better than look at Drever’s take on them. Not only do they stand, they convey mystery, age, silence.

Drever works from memory of place, rather than from photos. Her sketchbook is important, and private, a developing dialogue, which is an essential part of her finished work. Knowing when to stop – rather like in cartoons – is one of her several strengths. The coloured work is abstract and yet grounded; there’s a Zen simplicity that’s very satisfying. But the work isn’t precious at all – her oils are deliciously gutsy and textural, ochre and cream splattered with ink furze and weeds. Fine work. Will it sell, and keep her bairns in shoes? It should. It should.

You can contact these artists via their websites below, if you want to see more.

© Morag MacInnes, 2011

Links

• Laura Drever
• Britt Harcus
• Celia Clark