Lie Low

Solo exhibition  at Railway Street Studios, July - Aug 2020

Art and literature have had a profound influence on each other over the centuries. Jo Dalgety is no stranger to the dance between poetry and painting; she has been engaging with both from a young age. In recent times of upheaval and uncertainty, Jo serendipitously stumbled upon Wendell Berry’s poem, The Peace of Wild Things and a new series of paintings, mixed with collage and charcoal, developed.

When despair for the world grows in me…. I come into the peace of wild things…

Landscapes, but not of particular places, from memories and fragments appeared –  landscapes that you can enter, finding moments of stillness and space for renewal. 

Jo's method of reworking old material and reassembling it in new ways seems apt, a form of healing and rejuvenation. TJ McNamara commented on her “unusual technique of contrasting the transparency of watercolour with the intense black of charcoal. The effect is atmospheric landscapes that are rich despite being small.” Jo has since scaled up in her process, still capturing the essence and richness, transposing poetic words to visual form.

It is a fascinating interplay between art forms - the way poetry and painting relate to each other. Both capture an experience in a living, concentrated way. Both share a harmony, structure, colour and rhythm; in the compositional balance of a painting, one can almost speak of one colour "rhyming" with another. A poem communicates subliminally, unfolding through the senses as it moves along, much like a painting.

This series of work is about the solace and hope, the reassurance of the repeated rhythms of nature. The landscape can be a place of renewal, not only for artists but poets, walkers and wanderers too.

This Is the Time to Be Slow

by John O’Donohue

This is the time to be slow
Lie low to the wall
Until the bitter weather passes

Try, as best you can, not to let
The wire brush of doubt
Scrape from your heart
All sense of yourself
And your hesitant light.

If you remain generous,
Time will come good;
And you will find your feet
Again on fresh pastures of promise,
Where the air will be kind
And blushed with beginning.