MEET 
BARBARA MACKIE
FINE ART

ARTIST STATEMENT AND BIO

ARTIST STATEMENT  

The colours in my work are observed. They are nature’s colours, and I use colour as a subject within its context in the natural world. See Rainbow Light where a golden yellow at the heart of the work is the sun’s light after rain filling the sky. See autumn’s russet colours play around the trees in Ancient Oak and Old Oakwood due to a long dry 2018 summer that left the leaves on the branches way into November. See Warm Seabreeze where blue sky and dark sand evoke that atmosphere of air moving along the beach. My work centres on the natural and physical elements of the land. I try to capture characteristics without feeling the need to reproduce fine detail.  I have included some studies of bridges, roads and rails around the resurrected Borders railway. I have other work that is reduced fully to the abstract, see Reflection.  I enjoy dipping into natural history by writers such as Roger Deakin as these trigger my imagination through their description of the experience of living close to nature, and some of my work here is a direct response to walking in mature and ancient woodland.  In his book ‘Walnut Tree Farm’ Roger Deakin said “To enter a wood is to pass into a different world in which we ourselves are transformed”.  He stated that we carry places and landscapes in our head, that live on in us, wherever we may be, and however far we may be from them. He believed that we never forget these places and landscapes because we have experienced such intensity of life there. I concur with those beliefs as I find my own thoughts, ideas and memories are borne of such experience, finding their way into deep internal spaces, and over time re-emerging in the birth of new work. 

BIO

Based near Edinburgh, I concentrate on my visual arts practice, but earlier worked in the arts and education. following studies at Edinburgh College of Art and Yale University, USA.

IMAGES FROM THE DUKE'S ESTATE

Ancient Woodland and Monumental Bridges

Trees hundreds of years old and buildings and bridges of character.

LANDS

-field, mountain, weather and core-

ROAD AND RAILWAYS

-designed built & lasted-

LAND AND WATER

-rock, structure, estuary and beach-

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REFLECTION

The Beckoning, Marking and Tracing

YOUR VISIT

I hope you can see in my work, the inspiration that I have experienced within the physical environment and the importance that time, place and memory played in its expression. Early this year this work was on show at the Edinburgh Central Library.  Any information on future exhibitions will be notified here.