A project created by An Talla Solais, Ullapool. Artists from the Scottish Highlands, London and Galicia were invited to make art on a maritime theme, to fit into a standard small postal box. These were sent from venue to venue in each country. In London the gallery was a barge and in Galicia it was a castle. The exhibition will be re-made in Taigh Chearsabhagh, North Uist, in January 2016.

Ian has been leading workshops on the theme of passing on stories along the sea-routes.

His own contribution is a video which tells of the return of the sloop El Vigo to the yard where it was built - in Vigo, Spain and the discovery of a hidden story by the father and son who sailed their yacht from Strangford Loch to the boatyard of Astilleros Vigos.

  The Character of Water 

an ongoing collaboration with Christine Morrison and Highland Print Studio

creating photo-gravure prints to chart stories along the sea-routes

  the labourer at work in Highland Print Studio

Is A Thing Lost If you Know Where It Is?

            3 story installation Tent gallery ECA

            installation, with invited  artists, an Tobar, Isle of Mull

Crossing Alba (Collins Gallery, Glasgow)

  msn   

A  text message sent from El Vigo beating across open water, north of Scotland while poet Gerry Loose and photographer Morven Gregor, rowed the Forth and Clyde canal. A review in The Scotsman commented:

'The northerly voyage - meant to last nine hours, but taking 42 - is even harder to encapsulate. A snatch of film of a sunset over rolling seas manages to combine the twin senses of beauty and precariousness, if not its length, but it is Stephen's haiku-like text messages which perhaps capture it best: "Across the top/ 42 hours of headwinds/ there's easier ways." '

 falmadair (tiller)                      

This tiller for Jubilee was laminated from the larch planks which comprise an Orkney boat,  previously shown as an artwork at The Pier Arts Centre, Stromness.  The new tiller helped sail Jubilee to Stromness and was then displayed at The Pier while the vessel was moored outside - the larch reclaimed and commissioned. Other planks form the previous work were ripped to provide material for the gunnels of Broad Bay, an Orkney built boat (1912), fully rebuilt on Lewis. After the last exhibition, the tiller went back into service. The sail will be a storm trysail

Crossing Alba  Collaboration with Morven Gregor, Gerry Loose and Emmanuelle Waeckerlé.  (Collins Gallery, Univeristy of Strathclyde, Aug/Sept 2010). 

Catalogue available.

Shoreline (east side of Lewis)  

   detail of  primed planking, El Vigo

It's only one clear line.

One of the unwritten rules

between the sharp upper shape

and the lower

 probably

 a reflection.

 In this light now

the rocks in air and water

are strong, white, equal.

The little green's gone.

Maroon is a tint

in the charcoal blacks.

Version in Adrift (Periplum) and broadcast on Poetry Outdoors, Radio Scotland

Lobht nan Seol |The Sail Loft 

(with Moira Maclean, Carina Fihn, Mikko Paakkola) . 

   inaugural exhibition,
                                                                                 new An Lanntair | Stornoway | 2006

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Offshore/Onshore – with David Connearn . Runogalleria, Helsinki . 1999

Green Waters . (with Ian Hamilton Finlay and Graham Rich) . touring exhibition originated
The Pier Arts Centre . Stromness . 1998

Time & Tide . (With David Connearn) . inaugural exhibition . Art TM . Inverness . 1998

Broad Bay . photo-poems and texts in paintings by David Greenall . City Arts Centre . Edinburgh . 1997

A Level Of Lostness . with Katarina Pihlgren (Sweden), Carina Fihn (Sweden) and Mikko Paakkola (Finland)
Highland Printmakers, Inverness . 1996

Island Artists . group show . Crawford Arts Centre . St Andrews . 1996

Antislogans . group show . Cairn Gallery . Nailsworth . 1995

Poetry and Science . poems and photographs . Traverse Theatre . Edinburgh Science Festival . 1995

Shorelines . group show . Scottish Maritime Art . City Arts Centre . Edinburgh . 1994

Poetry and Landscape . Architectural Association School of Architecture . London . 1990

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Public Works

Taigh Chearsabhagh (commission to make public work as part of new extension
partnership Locate Architects) completion, Jan 2008.

confluence - a logbook, of voyages through three songs

with Saki Satom and Sophie Morrish
3 slate pages, with Saki Satom
films from 3 songs, with Andy Mackinnon

St Andrews University . 2007 . (with Pat Law) partnership with Reaich and Hall architects

Lobht nan Seol | The Sail Loft . Stornoway . 2006 – partnership with Highland Buildings Preservation Trust/LDN architects

  with Highland Buildings Preservation Trust

Uig Woods with Caroline Dear and Uig Primary School for The Woodlands Trust, Scotland . 2004

Texts developed in collaboration Craig Mackay . Ullapol High School . 2001
Sue Jane Taylor . Pultney Town . Wick . 2005

Clachan a Snabh Gu Eileanan (Stones Swim To Islands) 

      a commission, Taigh Chearsabhagh
                                                                                    Ballivanich School 1999

This work was damaged beyond repair in a winter storm.

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Vernacular Directions of Sailing (with Topher Dawson) An Tobar, Isle of Mull . 1997

being the necessary and sufficient information to show the shape of the skiff Argos