Monday the 23rd of April.

The morning was taken up with meeting people and arranging events!
I managed to meet Bruce from the Harbour Bar, Alex from Honblowers annd Douglas Welsh the fish merchant,  arrange food for the 5th and also to talk about the Maggie Law museum.

After some photographing around the coast .
I spend the afternoon with P1/2 at Gourdon Primary School. They where very wlecoming and enthusiastic. We Had a great time and am looking forward to foraging with them next week down on the beach!

After school I packed the caravan down in glorious weather and I took her to her off site home in Bervie.

it has been a great start to the project with many good connections I hope this will spread and we can get more involvement along the way from as diverse selection of the community as possible!

Sunday was a quiet day.
and I spent some time reflecting on the processes so far. I didn't have any Mystery tour bookings so I went up to the Maggie Law Museum to do  little more research.

I meet Arther Mowatt, who shared some of his memories with me about the village.
He talked about the silence in the village when the life boat as launched, that even the children new and understood the importance of the event and new instinctively it was something to respect.

He remembers peering i through the doors of the boat shed at the RNLI and sneaking in to the back of the Linen factory to try and get hold of Steelies ( bearings from the machines ) for marbles.



We chatted about his Mother and father and the Whale Dike have arranged to meet up another time to record some of his tales.


In the evening I went to The Mission hall to hear the Sunday service. I think there must have been about 15 people there and I was made to feel very welcome.

I met a number of the community and Dennis Rose the minister from Bervie. I was very interesting to meet another part of Gourdon's community. I was amusingly chastised for my door knocking hesitations

so am promising that I will be bolder on my return in May.

Had a good day  in Gourdon Village hall. A great venue for events and workshops.

We had only a few visitors but we made some beautiful Cyanotypes and Maps of the Village.

We used acetate and tracing paper along with seaweed and leaves to create patterns and illustrations that we left out side in the grey sunshine. 

We worked on paper and fabric

We talked about what we would like to see in the village. What did the young people feel they would like.

We wondered about a Cinema, so they did not have to travel so far to see a film.

We wondered about a book shop as there isn’t   even one in Stonehaven.

One of the parents talked about places to drink coffee. Maybe a café or gallery, some kind of hub or meeting point.

In the Afternoon. I worked with a Mrs Gove.

We went through her digital camera menus and unearthed lots of possibilities and different ways to use the camera.

Lots of playing has been prescribed and I look forward to hearing how things progress.

April

I arrived in the light on Friday night . The drive north was pretty uneventful ( especially after I worried so much about driving with the caravan on my own. On arrival however ,I think I made some amusing watching as I tried to reverse park the van in my little slot tucked away behind the harbour and chip shop. I manage to get there in the end and some helpful people came to my aid to help position it more aesthetically!

We then adjourned for a drink or two at the Harbour Bar.

 

Day 2

I spent some time recording sounds in Gourdon and getting some posters made to put up in the village I'm missing the Caravan today as could do with the coffe pot and table to carry on with planning. However the Harbour Bar are as ever very welcoming and accommodating and was very happy to meet William William and Gus

Have met up with John Gove who kindly introduced me to a number of Gourdon's historians in the Village. and am looking forward to meeting up with them to talk about their memories and interest.

Plans have been hatched about a BBQ event surrounding the Pub and Hornblowers perhaps with free  portraits maps and recordings.

I feel like things are progressing and am looking forward to Saturdays workshops and Meeting and talk with people on Sunday and Monday.

I spent some time beachcombing in readiness for Saturday.

Blue Egg

An eventful first day on the 17th of April. Having ID badges made followed by a very interesting dicussion with Mary Macleod who is looking at conservation proposals for the village.  We talked about the rich History of the village, the Telford harbour, the older buildings and the historical and current importance of Gourdon as a working village.

Then I met with Mrs Japp the Head teacher at Gourdon primary School. After a tour of the school we spent a time gazing at the amazing views and got down to talking about weather, architecture, whales and porpoises and then  how I could involve the school in the art project for village.

We talked about digital photography and Cyanotypes, and History and then language.

We both talked about a love of the history of words and we started to list the words that where very particular to Gourdon, and we struck on an idea to make an alphabet of words just for the village.

ie P is for Pleen ( seagull)

so this  will form another strand to my time in the village and I am hoping to work on this project with the Tadpoles group in May


After meeting with Mrs Japp I was kindly directed towards the Young people that run the Gourdon Skate park group ( and their Mum Michelle) Matthew and Reese. the creative work they had done was fantastic They along with their brother Eden ( fisherman from Gourdon Harbour) are going to help with some of the audio recording.

I felt it was such a positive day and am looking forward to starting the workshops and hearing peoples stories.

Lindsay

Busy Typing up schedules and writing workshops.
Excited about treasure hunts, and Mystery tours!

My name is Lindsay Duncanson. I am very excited to working as Gourdon Village Community Artist over the months of April and May 2012.

More information about my work can be found
www.productofboy.net
as well as twitter LBD_foto