Output details

Art as an Expression of Northernness: the Highlands of Scotland

This paper explores the idea of ‘northernness’ with respect to the Highlands of Scotland. It engages with both art history and art of the present. It is an outcome of the AHRC-funded project ‘Window to the West: Towards a Redefinition of the Visual within Gaelic Scotland’ (PI Macdonald, 2005-2011, £543K). It contributed to the development of an AHRC network (funded February 2013) led by Dr Ysanne Holt of Northumbria University. The paper notes a particular moment of European significance which relates both to the indigenous Gaelic culture of Highland Scotland and to external perceptions of it, namely the publication of James Macpherson’s Ossian in the 1760s. That text gave rise to a visual response across Europe from artists such as Alexander Runciman, J.M.W. Turner, Nicolai Abildgaard, Philipp Otto Runge and J.A.D. Ingres. It continues to be explored today by artists such as Calum Colvin and Norman Shaw. In this research Ossian provides a linking theme. The paper was developed from a presentation given to Northernness: Ideas And Images Of North In Visual Culture, a conference held at Northumbria University in June 2009. The paper relates closely to externally-funded invitations to Macdonald to present research in the form of Plenary addresses in both Finland and Iceland. At European Revivals – Myths, Legends and Dreams of a Nation, held in May 2009, at the Ateneum Art Museum, Helsinki (the National Gallery of Finland) Macdonald’s title was ‘The Celtic Revival in Scotland from James Macpherson to Patrick Geddes’. At Art in Translation: International Conference on Language and the Arts, at the University of Iceland and the Nordic House, Reykjavik, in May 2010, Macdonald’s title was ‘Ossian and Art: Translating Gaelic Culture’. These international plenary invitations reflect the interplay of national and international identities explored in the output.