Pen Drawings

A frequent collaborator of mine is the naturalist James Merryweather – a walk with him is a joy. He has opened my eyes to all the minutiae of the natural world; for example, the different ways in which fern 'crosiers' unfurl according to species. James and I have produced a number of columns together, 'Lochalsh Nature', for The Community News which was created in 2020 by the Kyle Community Trust as a way to connect people during the Covid crisis.

In a different way, my father's poems have opened up this landscape to me and inspired many drawings. I collaborated with him since our first Christmas card when I was about five years old, and I continue to make pictures in response to his poems after his death (January 2025). An intensification of this connection occurred latterly through our collaboration with Andrew Moorhouse, publisher of Fine Press Poetry books. With Andrew we made six books, the final one, Birds and Flowers, was published in 2024.

Both these collaborations required, for printing reasons, pen drawings. As someone who adores tone, I relish the difficult challenge of the distillation required to work in this economical way. It's so hard! But that's part of the fun. I frequently use pens to make quick drawings of my family. When you can't rub out, a different kind of concentration is needed.