Dundee Botanic Garden exhibition features work inspired by poet Mandy Haggith

A multi-media exhibition of artworks paired with poems opens at Dundee Botanic Garden on June 1.

The Trees Meet Sea exhibition consists of 14 pieces of visual art by 14 artists from the Highlands and Islands.

Each is a response to or has been responded to by a poem by writer and environmental activist Mandy Haggith.

The artists are Lynn Bennett-Mackenzie, Ann Coomber, Dorje Khandro Dawid, Helen Denerley, Chris Goodman, Lotte Glob, James Hawkins, Jan Kilpatrick, Kirsty O’Connor, Bill Ritchie, David Sandum, Fergus Stewart, Kathy Sutherland and Peter White.

They encompass video, painting, etching, sculpture, textiles and ceramics.

Postponed by Covid-19

The exhibition was due to open in 2020, but had to be postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

While many exhibitions went on-line, the artists and poet decided that a virtual version could not do justice to the multi-media richness of this particular combination of artworks and poetry.

Mandy Haggith said: “Poets don’t normally get to have exhibitions, so this is hugely exciting for me, and I’m thrilled that we’re able to bring this rich mixture of art together in dialogue with my poetry.

“I live on the shore of a loch in Assynt where trees meet sea and it’s a place of immense creative energy for me.

“By putting poems in paired conversation with visual artworks, there’s a sense of motion, back and forth, as feelings and ideas ebb and flow between words and images, making their way from letters to clay, thread, paint and pixel, and back again. You’ll need to be in the room with it to get its full effect.”

Residency

The exhibition was conceived through a residency at the National Trust’s Inverewe Garden, and is part of a wider Liminal Zone project run by Mandy Haggith.

It’s supported by Creative Scotland, exploring the seashore as a metaphor for interfaces and boundaries in our lives.

The exhibition was previously on show at the Sawyer Gallery at Inverewe Garden, It will be launched at Dundee Botanic Garden at 5pm on Wednesday June 1.

An elegant pamphlet of the poems and artworks, designed by Gerry Cambridge, is available from Mandy’s website here: https://www.mandyhaggith.net/shop.asp