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Hoy Sound

Artist: Wishart, Sylvia, RSA · 1936-2008

Hoy Sound

'it is about the bit of SEA that I look out on every/ day, I should call it 'Hoy Sound' or/ 'Pentland Firth'. 'Hoy Sound' I think for it/ is closer to…

'it is about the bit of SEA that I look out on every/ day, I should call it 'Hoy Sound' or/ 'Pentland Firth'. 'Hoy Sound' I think for it/ is closer to me...' (Wishart letter to Colin Greenslade reagarding 'Sea' exhibition at RSA in 2005) Letter is in Wishart's file in RSA Office and copy in her file in RSA archives (green box file , members research file U - W). There is a copy of a letter in Wishart's file that she sent to Bill Hare when he was preparing his book on Scottish Painters (published 1992), letter is undated, she discusses her painting and themes "I live on a hill looking over Scapa Flow the Pentland/ Firth to Sutherland Hills some of the Atalantic - no shelter so I/ get everything the elements can throw at me/ I cannot help but be influenced by the ever/ changing & sometimes aweful shift of light.......about 12 years ago a friend dropped in when I was out & with a felt pen drew on the window,/ amongst other things, a bird This for the/ first time made me consciously look at the/ window as well as through it....ever since that has led to a fascination with images/ found on the window pane, beyond & behind/ / leading inevitably to that ambiguity of space/ taht I suppose has always (held me?)....I never paint/ directly from what I'm seeing at any particular/ time. I make lots of notes & at a later date/ in the studio I play around with the 'ingredients'/ of a picture...The immediacy of putting on paint, pushing/ it around & taking it off again if necessary/ is the usual way of working..."

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