On Saturday 13th May the exhibition ‘The Cowboy and the Spaceman’ opens at Taigh Chearsabhagh Museum & Arts Centre in North Uist, showing photographs, prints, sculpture and a new film by Orkney artist Colin Kirkpatrick made with the Peacock Gallery’s Adam Proctor. The film addresses environmental matters close to the artist’s heart in the beautiful landscape of Orkney. A serious subject, but brought to the public with an artistic eye and a sense of humour.

‘The Cowboy and the Spaceman’ explores two very different views of planet earth. The cowboy, sitting atop his horse gazes out at a limitless horizon promising inexhaustible bounty, whereas the spaceman’s view back toward the earth is of a small, finite, living, breathing, blue and green sphere. Punctuating the film, containing stunning shots of the Orkney landscape, are a series of vignettes in which a number of islanders are asked to consider their impact on the planet – are they a cowboy or a spaceman?

The film forms the central focus of the exhibition which also contains photographs, sculpture and prints.

Kirkpatrick says: “Growing up, I witnessed fundamental social and ecological changes happening in Orkney: the dying fishing industry, the arrival of North Sea oil and later on, the industrialisation of salmon farming, and to a certain extent agriculture. I have always felt strongly that we shouldn’t sacrifice our superb natural heritage for short term gain, particularly when it is our islands’ greatest truly sustainable resource.”

References to the real and imagined Wild-West are found throughout Kirkpatrick’s work. Kirkpatrick says this stems from his Orcadian childhood: “In a child’s imagination it was a small leap to see your cattlemen uncles as cowboys and rural Orkney as Montana. A sea of cowboy boots at early barn dances and eight track Johnny Cash cassettes in most cars, made you realise in retrospect that you were living in what your elders often saw as a parallel frontier to the Wild West.”

Exhibition: 13 – 27 May, Mon – Sat 10am – 5pm

Artist's talk: Saturday 13 May 7.30pm (admission free)


for more information contact;

andy mackinnon
arts officer
taigh chearsabhagh
museum & arts centre
lochmaddy
isle of north uist
outer hebrides
HS6 5AA

t/f 01876 500 240
andy@taigh-chearsabhagh.org

www.taigh-chearsabhagh.org