I will use the Lucie Foundation Scholarship to return to Foula between May and August 2025. Foula, which derives its name from the Old Norse word for “Bird Island”, is often described as the most remote community in the British Isles with less than 30 residents and no pub or shop. It is so isolated that it uses its own calendar to date the passing of the skies, observing Christmas on 6 January. In 1936, Foula became the set of Michael Powell’s motion picture 'The Edge of the World', a drama inspired by the evacuation of St. Kilda about an ancient way of life under threat not only from the vagaries of the North Atlantic but from a rapidly modernising world. What does it look like to balance the conveniences of modernity and the environmental pressures of our post industrial age with the desire to preserve the heritage of this far flung corner of the British Isles in 2024? My goal is to create a series of 20 images and 20 prints to be published as a book and presented as both a gallery exhibition and an artist talk. By capturing portraits, landscapes, interiors and still lifes, my aim is to shed a light on the ecological and social challenges facing Foula today as a way to engage broader audiences with issues confronting remote communities in the 21st century. I will use the scholarship to cover materials, travel expenses, subsistence and accommodation throughout the duration of the project. Please note that the attached images include work from a separate unfinished project.
