Neil Cooper
LINKSHOUSE: A NEW HOME FROM HOME FOR ARTISTS ON ORKNEY A new artists’ residency on Orkney aims to create connections and opportunities for local artists and those from further afield 3
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When Linkshouse opens this summer as a new artistic hub on Orkney, it will mark the culmination of several different lives the grand house has lived over the last century. Based in the village of Birsay, on the north-west of Orkney’s Mainland, Linkshouse’s most recent incarnation was as the base of the Erlend Williamson Fellowship, a charity set up in honour of the artist who tragically died in 1996 in a climbing accident in Glencoe. Williamson had been a contemporary of artists including Ross Sinclair, Simon Starling and Mike Nelson. When Williamson’s parents, Barbara and Edgar, discovered the
exhibition and events programme and it holds a significant art collection donated by author, peace activist and philanthropist, Margaret Gardiner. Under the directorship of Neil Firth, the Pier Arts Centre duly picked up the mantle of Linkshouse in 2018. With investment from public bodies and a crowdfunding campaign, the house has been transformed into what is about to open as Linkshouse – Orkney Arts Residency. ‘It’s a big thing,’ says Firth of Linkshouse’s renovation, developed with Edinburgh-based architects, Studio Niro. ‘Philanthropy has always played a huge part in the Pier Arts
importance of Orkney in their son’s life and work, they set up the fellowship at Linkshouse in his honour with some of his peers and friends. One of the clauses in the Williamsons’ wills was that if the charity should close, then the property should pass into the care of the Pier Arts Centre, based 13 miles away in Stromness. For more than 40 years, the centre has run a year-round
Centre and now to see this happen, several generations on, allows us to develop a new base with a focus on practitioners. We’re still learning about how the building might work but we hope it becomes a landing strip for practitioners from elsewhere who are attracted here, as well as a bit of a launchpad for artists based on Orkney to connect up with networks [outside the islands].’
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1-4 Linkshouse 5 Frances Walker working on Rock Pool plate Orkney, 1983. Photo by John Cumming All images courtesy of Pier Arts Centre
‘With future partnerships featuring organisations such as the Royal Scottish Academy, Firth sees the redeveloped Linkshouse as a vital part of Orkney’s artistic life’
Linkshouse already has quite a history of welcoming artists and others to Orkney. The house was built in 1913 by local couple, Robert and Jane Comloquoy, who ran it as a guesthouse, naming it after the sandy links that stretch out to sea. In 1974, under owners Mr and Mrs Selwyn Hughes, Linkshouse was opened as the Orkney Field and Arts Centre, which hosted tours for groups interested in Orkney’s flora and fauna, as well as artists’ residencies from the likes of John Busby, Frances Walker and Allen Lawson. In 1976, Richard Demarco’s Edinburgh Arts programme brought students from Durham University to the centre, where they received a lecture by Orcadian historian Ernest W Marwick. Linkshouse continued as the Orkney Field and Arts Centre when the house was bought in 1980 by naturist and author Robin Noble and his wife Iona, with residencies continuing for several years before it was purchased by the Williamsons in 1999. Over almost two decades of the Erlend Williamson Fellowship, artists including Laura Mansfield and Mike Nelson spent time at Linkshouse. With future partnerships featuring organisations such as the Royal Scottish Academy, Firth sees the redeveloped Linkshouse as a vital part of Orkney’s artistic life. ‘Orkney’s an interesting place,’ he says. ‘It’s got lots of artistic activity going on, and that enables us to think about things, not just as a visual arts organisation, but to be able to utilise culture in a much broader sense. I see Linkshouse playing a big part of that, and a big part of the future of the Pier Arts Centre.’ Neil Cooper is a writer and critic based in Edinburgh For more info on Linkshouse – Orkney Arts Residency, check out pierartscentre.com/linkshouse-1
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