A captivating group exhibition titled "Making Waves; Breaking Ground" is currently showcasing the work of 11 contemporary Scottish and international artists at the Bowhouse in St Monans, Fife, Scotland. The exhibition, which prominently features numerous images exploring the blurred, textured qualities of light, presents an especially fitting theme for this coastal Scottish location, where soft shadows and dense, milky daylight characterize the current season.
Curators Sophie Camu and Alexander Lindsay spearheaded this ambitious project, collaborating with London's Purdy Hicks Gallery to bring together works spanning painting, photography, and film. These often ethereal pieces collectively explore the natural environments of our contemporary world, offering viewers a fresh perspective on how we interact with and perceive nature around us.
Among the standout pieces is Susan Derges' "Full Moon Spawn" from 2007, which becomes increasingly captivating the longer viewers study it. While initially appearing to be a straightforward depiction of the full moon, the work defies expectations by framing the celestial body not with typical scudding clouds, but with strange, jellied clumps and waterborne debris. The image gradually reveals itself as offering a perspective from beneath the water's surface, presenting what might be described as a trout's-eye view of the night sky, as if our atmosphere consisted not of air but of fresh water teeming with frog spawn.
Derges gained prominence in the 1990s for her innovative photograms of the River Taw near her Devon home, created without using a traditional camera. Working at night, she would submerge photographic paper within flowing water and use the rippled, reflected moonlight to leave its imprint on the immersed sheets. For "Full Moon Spawn," Derges developed a more elaborate studio setup, continuing her exploration of what could be called an "aqueous perspective" – her ongoing fascination with how things appear when viewed through liquid mediums. For this artist, photography itself is fundamentally a watery endeavor.
Samantha Clark's large acrylic paintings contribute another compelling dimension to the exhibition. Her 2024 work "Haar" – named after the term used throughout Scotland and England's east coast for the clammy sea fog that silently billows inland from the ocean – depicts a thick, vaporous field constructed from complex, overlapping meshes of meticulously drawn lines. Clark, who now lives in Orkney where she painted this piece, has created other works with evocative titles such as "This Salted Light," "Submerge," and "Salt Fog Light." Water's omnipresence serves as her guiding theme, representing for her the interconnecting, life-giving tissue that flows through both human beings and the landscape itself.
The exhibition also features three Finnish photographers: Santeri Tuori, Jorma Puranen, and Sandra Kantanen. Both Kantanen and Tuori revisit in separate ways a painterly theme that deeply preoccupied Claude Monet in his later years: the instability of light on foliage floating on still pond surfaces. Puranen proves equally captivated by scattered, refracted light, maintaining in his images – particularly in his series "Icy Prospects" – a productive ambiguity about the substantiality of his subjects. In one striking example, a frozen surface thick with bubbles mirrors a winter sky in a way that paradoxically makes it appear wet and watery.
Camu and Lindsay present the exhibition's works as challenging traditional concepts of landscape art – a bold claim given that many participating artists demonstrate clear familiarity with established traditions. Samantha Clark, for instance, has written extensively about her interest in William Turner's watercolors in her poignant memoir "The Clearing." However, it seems accurate to suggest that few artists in this exhibition would identify with the values that the landscape genre has too often embraced throughout history.
The western landscape tradition has frequently served as the preferred visual form for expressing possession of others' land, but the artists in "Making Waves; Breaking Ground" share a commitment to pursuing more compassionate ways of looking and existing within a place. They practice modes of attentiveness that resist reducing their surroundings to easily accessible spectacles, instead acknowledging physical interconnectedness with the world around them.
What distinctly links the works throughout this exhibition is a noticeable absence of horizon lines. Rather than maintaining traditional compositional elements, these artists immerse themselves in atmospheres or enter worlds filled with things that seem to loom up unpredictably. This approach reflects a deliberate refusal to prioritize between the infinitesimally small and cosmic immensity, treating all scales of existence with equal significance.
Most importantly, these artists reject the notion of separation from the worlds they depict. Their work suggests that our seeing eyes are composed of the same physical substances as the things they observe, challenging fundamental assumptions about the relationship between observer and observed. This philosophical approach transforms the act of viewing art into an experience of recognition rather than distant appreciation.
"Making Waves; Breaking Ground" continues through August 31 at the Bowhouse in St Monans, Fife, with free admission. The exhibition offers visitors an opportunity to experience this innovative approach to understanding our place within the natural world through the lens of contemporary artistic practice.
