Landscape Archives - The Stray Ferret

Photo of the Week: Morning Sky

This week’s photograph was taken by Michael White, who captured a fantastic red sky over Birstwith early one morning.

Michael White

Photo of the Week celebrates the Harrogate district. It could be anything from family life to capturing the district’s beauty. We are interested in amateur and professional photographs, in a landscape format.

Send your photographs to letters@thestrayferret.co.uk for a chance to be featured next week, we reserve the right to adjust and crop images to fit into our format.

Photo of the Week: Indi’s New Year walk

This week’s photograph was taken by Alistair Hay while out walking his dog Indi, capturing the sunset from the Follifoot dismantled Railway.

Alistair Hay

Send your photographs to letters@thestrayferret.co.uk for a chance to be featured next week, we reserve the right to adjust and crop images to fit into our format.

Photo of the Week: Fountains Abbey at night

This week’s photograph was taken by John Shepherd, capturing the moon shining over Fountains Abbey at the Christmas illumination night.

John Shepherd

Send your photographs to letters@thestrayferret.co.uk for a chance to be featured next week, we reserve the right to adjust and crop images to fit into our format.

Garden seeks artist for year-long residency in Harrogate

Artists across the Harrogate district are being sought by RHS Harlow Carr as the garden aims to appoint its next artist in residence.

The year-long appointment would see the chosen artist encouraged to take inspiration from the landscape, as well as the charity’s scientific and biological work.

Education and learning manager Kirstie Blything said:

“We are looking for an artist to present a personal interpretation and perspective of Harlow Carr, creating new work that is innovative, pushes boundaries and inspires well-being.

“We hope this new work will inspire the public to examine their own vision of the gardens and encourage them to engage in new, creative conversations, continuing the development of Harlow Carr as a site that inspires creative practice.”

The artist would spend at least three weeks on site, carrying out research and demonstrating their practice at the garden.

They would be able to work closely with the garden’s team as well as discussing their work with the public. The role includes creating a programme of workshops, talks, open studios and more to encourage visitors to take inspiration from the gardens for their own creativity.

The year would end with an exhibition at the RHS Harlow Carr Flower Show in 2023.

Previous artists in residents include Nel Whatmore and Anita Bowerman.

For further information about the role, click here. Applications close on Friday, May 20 at noon.

Pyramid artforms at Fountains Abbey bring echoes of the past

Striking contemporary art, with echoes from the past, has been installed at Fountains Abbey and Studley Royal water garden.

Visitors to the 800-acre UNESCO World Heritage site, will see a visual transformation, brought about through the work of Steve Messam.

His three thought-provoking installations titled These Passing Things, have been designed to prompt another way of looking at landscape and historic buildings.

Drifted – 12 Floating pyramids in the canal – takes its inspiration from a lost pyramid folly, designed as a memorial monument to honour John Aislabie, the original designer of the water garden.

Following Aislabie’s death, in June 1742, his son William commissioned a 16-metre-high funerary pyramid.

Bridged, reflected in the waters of the river Skell, stands out in the landscape with the abbey ruins providing a stunning backdrop.

However, despite archive records of scale drawings and detailed costings for the piece, no further mentions of it were ever made and no record or evidence exists of this mysterious pyramid ever being built

Mr Messam’s second artwork is Bridged – a scarlet contemporary bridge sitting across the river Skell, close to the site of a lost iron bridge from the 18th century.

The Drifted and Bridged installations will be on display throughout the summer, while Spiked – an inflatable artwork – will be making occasional appearances.

It bursts through the columns of The Temple of Piety, with a statue of Neptune, the Roman god of the sea, looking on from the lake.

Steve Messam is pictured with Spiked, which provides the opportunity to reflect on the contrast between classic and contemporary artforms

The Aislabie family, created many follies to surprise and delight their 18th century guests and Mr Messam hopes his contemporary works will attract similar attention.

He said:

“I guess the overall thing is identifying with the whole concept of follies – architectural oddities of no specific function, other than their visual aesthetic.

“While, over time, we may invest them with meaning or stories, at their core they’re just there – large-scale artworks in the landscape. As an artist that’s what I’ve been interested in for the past 20 years.

“I’m also interested in the role that follies play in creating focal points in constructed views of the landscape.”

Justin Scully, general manager at Fountains Abbey and Studley Royal, said:

“Studley Royal water garden is a designed landscape; a living work of art.

“By working with artists, responding to this legacy, we’re helping to bring the water garden to life for our visitors today.

“We hope that These Passing Things will get our visitors thinking and start a conversation about the connection between the past and the present, whilst offering people a relevant, fresh experience of the Georgian garden.

Through its Trust New Art programme, which is supported by Arts Council England and the Arts Council of Wales, the National Trust aims to connect more people to its places through contemporary arts.

More details can be found at nationaltrust.org.uk/fountainsabbey

This week’s photograph was taken by John Shepherd, capturing the moon shining over Fountains Abbey at the Christmas illumination night.

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