Tide and Time | Fiona MacRae
Posted by Kim Soep on
Fiona MacRae’s new series of mixed-media works brings together found timber and other sea-worn surfaces gathered over a lifetime of beachcombing along Scotland’s west coast.
The artist writes: “When Covid hit, we had just sold our house on Tiree of 54 years. A lifetime of beachcombing finds was cleared from the house and my immediate thought was, if I die, this will all be dumped or burnt. All these bits of wood have had a previous life, ended up in the sea for whatever reason, possibly crossed the ocean. They are about drawing attention to things we would normally disregard and my observation of colour in my immediate environment; no two colours are the same as I am constantly mixing.”
Onto each salvaged surface, MacRae paints swatches of hand-mixed colour arranged in geometric and decorative compositions. No colour is repeated. Instead, the palette is drawn from the artist’s surroundings: the greens of shoreline vegetal, lichen greys, peat browns, the soft mauves of heather-covered hills, and the pale yellows of low coastal sunlight. These colours become markers of place and time—records of weather, season, and shifting light.
The found objects retain traces of their former lives. Worn edges, rust stains, nail holes, and weathered grain remain visible, asserting their histories as an integral part of each work. In this way, the painted surfaces and salvaged materials exist in dialogue, each bearing evidence of the environments that have shaped them.
MacRae’s mixed-media works invite a slower, more attentive form of looking. By imposing ordered grids and carefully observed colour systems onto objects shaped by the unpredictability of the sea, she creates a conversation between the cerebral approach of humans and the changeful forces of nature. Each piece brings together multiple histories: the artist’s lived experience of Scotland’s west coast, the past life of the object itself and the continual action of the sea that has worn, carried, and transformed it. The painted colours and weathered surfaces become intertwined records of not only time and place but social history. In this meeting of memory, material, and tide, objects once overlooked are redefined, revealing layers of beauty and meaning accumulated over time.
Fiona MacRae (b. 1965) is an award-winning artist based in Argyll, Scotland. She has a degree in Fine Art Painting from Glasgow School of Art. Her practice is influenced by the surrounding landscapes of Scotland's West Coast.