‘A brief hibernation’ Emma McNally -Artist Residency
Last autumn, to launch our artist residency programme, we invited the artist Emma McNally to
stay in our cabin. Here are some of her reflections on the experience:
“The cabin was idyllic. Simple in a way that is evidence of careful and loving thought.
It was a dwelling, a cave, a hut, a hermit’s cell, a nest, a secret place, secluded, nestling
inside a beautiful cove of trees, grasses, shrubs. Perfectly peaceful, perfectly calm, deeply
quiet. The sort of place that everyone dreams of when they need respite, when they need to
rest, mull, dream.
It was a porous space, blurring the separation between inside and outside. With two glass
doors facing east and west, the light and shadows moved through the day from morning to
the evening. Filtering through the leaves of the trees, the shadows dappled and danced
across the simple plain walls with their delicate pattern of wood swirl. In the early morning,
with the blind down, I watched the shadows of small birds darting while I drank my coffee.
I was there for exactly the time when autumn really arrives. The colours of the leaves, all
umbers, siennas, earths, changed by the hour. The sound they made drifted between rain
and surf. When the rain fell the sound was on the roof and against the glass.
I was reminded of listening to a blind man talking on the radio, saying that when the rain
falls the blind can see the shape of trees. The leaves, fell, drifted, tumbled, cascaded with
the changing weather. Windfalls. The sweetening rich dark smell of autumn, mulching,
fermenting, decomposing. Berries, rosehips, apples. The smell of woodsmoke. At night an owl
sat in the tree close by and called to friends that answered from a distance. One had a voice
that was reedy, another clear as a bell. The stars were breathtaking. It’s been a long time
since I saw a night sky undimmed by citylight. I saw 5 shooting stars one night sitting out
with Ania.
It was such a joy to have hot showers outside in the chill air with dark clouds gathering,
rain beginning to fall and to return to the warmth of the cabin to drink tea and read.
To venture out from the refuge of the cabin to the coast and to be in the company of millions
of years of geologic convulsion was wonderful. The Devonian Era is named for Devon. A
vast expanse. All the slow drama of strata, rupture, buckle, collapse written into the
extraordinary formations. So beautiful. I think about geology a great deal when I’m drawing.
This will stay with me.
When I arrived I was exhausted after moving out of my London studio (where I’ve been
working for 8 years.) It did me so much good. A magical place that brought rest and the quiet
to dream. Sometimes you need to just watch leaves fall.
I felt kinship with the hedgehogs nestling in their secret dens. A brief hibernation, a real
rest after a very demanding period.
I have no doubt that the residency will offer others up ahead the opportunity to lay aside
oppressive and exhausting demands of Productivity. To question what such demands really
mean. It will offer the chance to be in the midst of the rhythms of so much beauty, to let go,
to not hold on so hard and to have faith.”