Waterfalls-an evening with Oscar Van Heek, John Glenday and Amanda Thomson

Schedule

Fri Jul 07 2023 at 07:00 pm to 08:30 pm

Location

Scottish Poetry Library | Edinburgh, SC

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Waterfalls - an evening with Oscar van Heek, John Glenday and Amanda Thomson
About this Event

Join photographer Oscar Van Heek in conversation with the SPL's Sam Tongue as they discuss the difficulties and delights of finding and photographing the waterfalls of Scotland. They will be joined by poet John Glenday and author Amanda Thomson who will read their-and other's-contributions to the project.

‘The space the magnitude of mountains and waterfalls. I live in the eye, and my imagination, surpassed, is at rest. I shall learn poetry here'.

So writes Keats on his walking tour of Scotland. Taking a grand tour of Scotland and visiting the spectacular waterfalls, became a national obsession with Turner, Walter Scott, Byron and Burns all leading the vanguard.

Since those heady Victorian days the paths leading to well over 1000 waterfalls, have become overgrown, and many falls have all but disappeared from our maps.

Now against the backdrop of climate change and a global pandemic, there has never been a more urgent need to reconnect with nature.

Waterfalls now invites contemporary, post-pastoral and ecologically aware and authors, artist, and poets to connect with nature in much the same way as their romantic counterparts did.

Be it in the form of a simple diary entry, a social comment, poem, or haiku, author's work including that of; Kathleen Jamie; Jen Hadfield; Anthony Vahni Capildeo; Cal Flyn; John Glenday; Malachy Tallack; Amanda Thomson; Elspeth Wilson; Ceitidh Campbell and Marjorie Lofti, will be exhibited at the Scottish Poetry Library, accompanied by specially created images by Oscar van Heek to form a unique exhibition.

About

Oscar van Heek works as a film maker, writer and fine art photographer. He has been nominated for the SONY WORLD PHOTOGRAPHY AWARDS 2019, and has work selected for the 2021 and 2022 RSA, the 2023 RCA and recently exhibited at SONICA GLASGOW 2022 for the WW1film installation Iron Harvest.

John Glenday has published four collections of poetry: The Apple Ghost (Peterloo Poets, 1989), which received a Scottish Arts Council Book Prize; Undark (Peterloo Poets, 1995), which was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation: Grain (Picador, 2009), shortlisted for both the Ted Hughes Award and the Griffin International Poetry Prize; and The Golden Mean (Picador, 2015), shortlisted for the Saltire Scottish Poetry Book of the Year and Winner of the 2015 Roehampton Prize.

Amanda Thomson is a Scottish writer and visual artist, and a lecturer at the Glasgow School of Art. Her first book, A Scots Dictionary of Nature, was published in 2018. She is also the author of Belonging, which was longlisted for the 2022 Highland Book Prize. She has spoken at many book festivals and had her work published in Antlers of Water, Willowherb Review, The Wild Isles, Gifts of Gravity and Light and the Guardian. She lives and works in Strathspey in the Scottish Highlands and Glasgow.


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Where is it happening?

Scottish Poetry Library, 5 Crichton's Close, Edinburgh, United Kingdom

Event Location & Nearby Stays:

Tickets

GBP 5.00

Scottish Poetry Library

Host or Publisher Scottish Poetry Library

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