Tag Archives: Richard hawley

The end of something

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In this film I attempt to tell a bit of the story of the beginning of the end of Usan.

Behind the Keith Mausoleum on the rock of Skae I noticed a Celtic cross that commemorated a doctor: Dr W A Mackintosh who died in 1911 just before the war. I wondered who he was?

Back home I discovered that he was the last Laird of Usan and had died suddenly in his bath. This was the beginning of the end for the Fishertoon of Usan.

In this film I find a connection between an enamel bath (vessel) and the Trawlers (vessels) that did an end to the laird and hand-line fishing respectively. Usan then went into decline.

At the time of this Angus adventure I was reading Ernest Hemingway’s short stories “in our time”. They were written not long after WWI and reflect his terrible experiences. They are somewhat brutal.

The music in this film all comes from the BBC Proms: Scott Walker Revisited. I have been rather moved by this performance of words and music of yesteryear (words and music that were barely noticed for decades)

The end of something from omphalos.

two ragged soldiers

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This is a short film with some images from the east of Scotland. I explored with my friend Ian and we visited many places, including Fishtown of Usan, St Skae, Bridge of Dun, Brechin and Montrose.

two ragged soldiers from omphalos on Vimeo.

Music credit: Scott Walker Revisited http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b08z2x62/bbc-proms-2017-scott-walker-revisited

Hundy Mundy

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call it folly, call it my pursuit
a sense of loss,
the secret of art.

[the body of work reflects the disappearance of the artist himself]

Music credits:
(1) Bluebell, cockleshell 1-2-3 by King Creosote (From Scotland with love)
(2) Leave your body behind you – by Richard Hawley

Unfinished, Beautiful. Everything.

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Recently I visited Carstairs mausoleum. It was erected by Dr William Fullerton in 1784 and placed at the end of a vista from the house. At one time the route to the Mausoleum was lined by mighty Beech trees but these have not survived the centuries and now the mausoleum is isolated and lost in a large field.

In 1782, two of Dr Fullerton’s children died, Betty and Thomas, then two years later his beloved wife Isabel died.

Below the entrance portico an inscribed tablet has fallen:
“SIBI ET SUIS EXTRUI CURAVIT CRUILIELMUS FULLERTON DE CARESTAIRS AD 1784.”

“In AD 1784 William Fullerton of Carstairs arranged for this to be erected for his and his own”

Dr Fullerton lived on for a further twenty years. After he died his son-in-law demolished the family mansion and rebuilt the rather monstrous Gothic pile that survives to this day.

Music credits:
Richard Hawley - "I remember you" and "Half the world" from the 
album Mid-Air

The borrowed words:
come from "Grief is the thing with feathers" by Max Porter and 
"The Black Mirror" by Raymond Tallis