Drowned, Drained, Swamped & Bogged Down:
Initiating A Creative Exploration Of Mythterious Scottish Marshes & Wetlands
CREATIVE: Seven Lochs Wetland Park, Glasgow
This landscape visit felt like a good beginning, close to home but somehow the furthest away in time.
I felt inspired by the ancient people that used and inhabited this landscape long before the city rose up around the wetlands. The early Mesolithic hunter-gathers that would have camped and hunted on the shores of the lochs, following the animals and wildfowl among the bright, spongey spagnum moss and spindly stunted birches.
The enchanting beauty of the swans, that might have one been their game - their beaks bright against the wintery cold.
That rusty orange. It seemed to appear again and again - in oozing pools and beech leaves and lichen and the peachy body of a bullfinch - but also in the cigarette buts, crisp packets and rusty metal littering this urban wetland.
That broken glass on the ancient stone, like some sort of ceremonial altar.
Of course, I also couldn’t neglect the crannog - the ancient type of loch dwelling discovered here, which would have one risen from the waters. The finds from Lochend crannog - wood piles, cross timbers, quern stones for milling, hazelnut shells and bones both animal and human. The thatched roof of heather and wattle, daubed with clay from the loch banks.
Inspired by the idea of some some of ancient prehistoric spirit of this place, I set about making a mask from mod roc and plaster, with a bronze and copper undercoat layered over with mossy greens and verdigris hues.
I was taken with the idea of something rising from the waters. The key sites of interest were Woodend Loch, where the Mesolithic stone tools were found - the flint blades. A place where antler tipped harpoons were probably using to catch fish and knapped stone arrow heads speared water birds. Where flint was struck on Iron pyrite (fools gold) to light fires.
I came across a fascinating blog article from The Urban Historian along with an outline map of both Woodend and Lochend Lochs.
Projecting onto board I traced the outlines, marking the locations of the Crannog and the Lithic Scatter before daubing most of the board in a bright mossy green - that thick blanket across this whole landscape which makes it so special.
The crannog here was burned down at least once, so I marked it with charred driftwood, while a piece of fool’s gold would be attached to mark the lithic scatter.
The crannog here was burned down at least once, so I marked it with charred driftwood and mixed charcoal with paint to coat over the bright board. A piece of fool’s gold would be attached later to mark the lithic scatter. I coated birch twigs in bright orange and was drawn to form a head-dress around the mask - part hunting-camouflage, part-crown - weaving in moss, swan feathers, rushes and that most Scottish shrub, heather - thatching material for humans and cover for wildlife.
I crafted small arrow from driftwood and affixed a knapped-flint arrowhead using birch tar.
While rotating the board, I discovered quite accidentally that the outline of the lochs were a pair of lungs. Or wings?
I fixed the arrow to point towards the site of the Mesolithic finds and the partially-hidden fool’s gold and the bed of wildfowl feathers. I textured the surface with rusty clay - embedding small flint microliths and shards of green broken glass.
Finally, as a nod to the road-kill I saw on leaving the wetland, I lifted the masked spirit above its watery lungs with roe deer antlers.
