What was said about Hansel > 'REFLECTIONS, poems and drawings'

I'm sitting here with a copy of Sylvia Wishart's painting Reflections 1 in front of me, as well as a copy of this book which is dedicated to her. I've learned about her since getting the book and feel confident that she's very much reflected in the poetry and drawings of Yvonne Gray and John Cumming. The book's title has been carefully chosen, and it's surely taken from this series of paintings which includes a thoughtful image of herself which I hesitate to call a self portrait since she's just part of all that is reflected in glass.

I always enjoy seeing what emerges from any collaboration between artists and this peerie book is in itself an artwork. The source for Yvonne Gray's writing and John Cumming's drawings is the life and work of this relatively little-known but significant artist who took her inspiration from the world around her, and from her Orkney home in particular.

"Reflections" opens with a quote from Sylvia Wishart, describing that world in a letter to a friend. "The sea is rarely at peace and the light and the seasons ever changing too...The hares run by the window, the birds and boats sail by. In some lights, a window behind me has its reflections cast onto the glass in front of me..."

The hare and the birds come alive in the pen and ink drawings created by John Cumming, each proof of careful observation. A line, a wash, a stroke - the drawings seem so simple, yet are so strong. John does supply a note on one of them describing a strange encounter he came across - a hare hurling itself aloft to tackle a hoodie crow that's dared to come too near and threaten it. It would be vandalism to cut out the pictures, separating them from the poems, but it would be lovely to have them framed and arranged by themselves just to look at.

I've written about the drawings first, because my eye was was "drawn" to those when I first opened the book. Only once I'd had time to appreciate them, did I turn to Yvonne Gray's poems and found them equally informed by her careful observation of nature in action.

Yvonne has used a variety of poetic styles, haiku and villanelle among them, and that choice seems to me to reflect an artist's manner of experimenting with different techniques. The art is in the writing too, where colour, light and shade emerge in different poems. In "Hares" we read

"...The light moves on.
Across the Sound violet hills
swell in the simmerdim.

Shadows gather
on the slope above the shore.
In the grimlins forms emerge -
a stone ring, a dusky pantheon;
statues poised on the land's rim."

Equally evocative I think are these few lines from "Leaving"

"...your heart is caught
snagged
by the small red boat that gleams

in the low sunlight, poised
on calm water
a fisherman hauling creels
off Braga."

Can't you see it? In your imagination? In reality and as a painting?

Both writer and artist in "Reflections" are obviously familiar with Sylvia Wishart's paintings and her personality, admire her and were fond of her, so the work here is a tribute to someone held in affectionate regard.

This impression, which I got from these poems and drawings, sent me to find out more about her. I've mentioned the print of Reflections 1 where the artist is so very "present" with her steady gaze out the window. I've also found a most splendid photo which was likely taken at her house near Stromness. She's sitting on what might be a kist, a peerie bit of what appears to be a large painting on the wall behind her, alongside a small TV set with a jar of paint brushes and a ship in a bottle on top of it. She has a cigarette in her hand and the straight look she's giving the photographer could be interpreted as quizzical though there's a smile there too. It brings to mind one of Yvonne's word pictures - the poem she's called "Down catching the last of the light", written as an acrostic that spells SYLVIA.

Finally, I'm sure we all know the saying "never judge a book by its cover" but I feel I must congratulate Woodend Publishing and Hansel Cooperative Press on that very thing. The quality of the paper they've chosen for pages and cover make it a pleasure to handle.

I wonder what Sylvia Wishart would have made of it. Would she have given a laugh and a smile, shaking her head at John and Yvonne, and poured them a dram to toast their achievement?

'REFLECTIONS, poems and drawings', Mary Blance, The Shetland Times/The Orcadian, February 2013, 1st of February 2013