The Meaning of Flowers

January 13, 2014 by susanmoirmackay

I’ve been fighting shadows, in this case the shadow has a name, ‘Insurance Company’. A little hidden clause in my contract means that although they will pay for water damage, they will not pay for wood that has rotted due to water damage. Apparently, I was supposed to telepathically know that there was water leaking behind the pristine white tiles, before it became ‘rotted wood’.  To placate me, the smooth-voiced man on the phone from the insurance company, apologises for […]

Categories: Art, Conceptual Art, contemporary art • Tags: Anya Gallacia, art, dying flowers, Flowers, Marcel Duchamp, van gogh

Selfie Society!

November 21, 2013 by susanmoirmackay

My children are posing in front of me, lips flared, bottoms sticking out – with dramatic obscenity and two fingers held up in front of their faces. This, they tell me, is the new style for ‘selfies’. Selfies, in case you somehow missed it, is a self portrait (photograph) posted online. And the point of the selfies, to my cynically bemused eye, is to remind the world, if not yourself, how fabulous you look! Or an opportunity for self flagellation […]

Categories: Art, Conceptual Art, contemporary art, nudes, photography, Portraits, Self Portrait, Selfie, society • Tags: art, conceptual art, frida khalo, lucien freud, portrait, sarah lucas, self portrait, selfies, van gogh

The Great Tapestry of Scotland

October 18, 2013 by susanmoirmackay

I did not expect to be moved by a tapestry. But I should have known better… Stitching has long fascinated me. Maybe due to the early influence of Maggie Lechie’s needlework pictures framed in my family home or the white linen table cloths with neat embroidery stitches done by my Mother when she was young. Either way stitching fascinates me . . A close up of The Great Tapestry of Scotland,  from http://www.scotlandtapestry.com . Stitching, as a general term, encompasses anything […]

Categories: Art, Profile • Tags: Andrew Crummy, art, community art project, crewel, embroidery, stitch, tapestry, The Great Tapestry of Scotland

Blood, bones, hair and soap…

October 10, 2013 by susanmoirmackay

    There is an awful intimacy to drawing on bones. These are the bones of a dolphin. As I plot and mark or discover each slight nuanced gradient with my pen or pencil I feel as if I am probing into an unspeakable salty truth. But there is also something overwhelmingly awe inspiring in the intricacy of the structure of the bone. The bones fit in an astoundingly precise sequence to create what once was its back bone. Each […]

Categories: Art, Conceptual Art, contemporary art, human nature, mandalas • Tags: art, blood, bones, conceptual art, death, hair., marina abramovic, skeleton

It’s a small world after all….

October 8, 2013 by susanmoirmackay

Pyxus 13 – mixed media – 2013 Its a small world after all… I made this piece in The Bahamas before we packed up and left. It was inspired by the small hidden places where one might tuck secrets – a cavity of unwelcome things. A common white fabric that has stitched in its entrails unspoken and unspeakable truths. I wonder about all the things we hide, especially from ourselves.  How well we must stitch them deeper and deeper inside. Inevitably […]

Categories: Art, contemporary art, Grand Bahama, The Bahamas • Tags: art, Bahamas, secrets, shame, small

March 23, 2013 by susanmoirmackay

Categories: Art, contemporary art, Grand Bahama, The Bahamas • Tags: art, Bahamas

NE6- Anthropology 2012- Human, System, Object.

January 19, 2013 by susanmoirmackay

2012 was supposed to be our end time and yet, we are still here! ‘Kingdom Come’ was the title of this year’s National Exhibition at the National Art Gallery of The Bahamas. Artists were invited to explore the theme of apocalypse, personal or universal. Interestingly apocalypse ‘translated literally from Greek, is a disclosure of knowledge, hidden from humanity in an era dominated by falsehood and misconception’. (wikipedia) This quote intrigued me. And I decided to direct my approach from this […]

Categories: Art, Conceptual Art, contemporary art, National Art Gallery of the Bahamas, Portraits, society, The Bahamas • Tags: art, Bahamas, conceptual art, construct, structure

Boundaries: The Experience- Art and Phenomenological!

June 16, 2012 by susanmoirmackay

Last night I had disturbed dreams, flashes of colour, an intense vision of looking through back lit trees in a dark night – a vivid green, lime and yellow flashing across my eyes.  There was some feeling of connecting the pieces we had made earlier at the hall in L’Utopia with this ephemeral, translucent colour. And so another Wednesday night spent restlessly, resulting in getting up and reading till 5.30am in an attempt to draw myself back into sleep. Was I over […]

Categories: Art, boundaries, boundary, Conceptual Art, fear, Grand Bahama, human nature, life, light, musings, Profile, spirituality • Tags: art, art as process, art projects, conceptual art, process

Boundaries- An Art and Phenomenological Experience

June 7, 2012 by susanmoirmackay

Tonight I introduced to a few brave souls, my concept for an art and phenomenological experience.  8 of us altogether, a healthy mix of spiritual and art minded characters.   I am not leading this event, merely offering my fellow travelers a formula in which to follow.  I am not leading because I have been curious to do this exercise for a while…and so I wanted to share the idea with my friends and see what happens…. Also, L’Utopia is […]

Categories: Art, Conceptual Art, course in miracles, Grand Bahama, spirituality • Tags: art, art projects, Bahamas, boundaries, Boundary, healthy, process, spirituality

Night at the Bazaar!

October 8, 2011 by susanmoirmackay

For Art Nucleus, as one of our activities we met at the International Bazaar last night I have been longing to do something like this since I did “Ecstatic Shadows”.  I realise that as curator, though thoroughly involved in the theme, I did not have time to leisurely explore in my own work.  And for many years I have been prowling the streets and beach gazing at light and dark.  At shadows and blackness that folds in on blackness.  It is a […]

Categories: Art, Grand Bahama, International Bazaar, The Bahamas • Tags: art, Grand Bahama, International Bazaar