The longest day of the year

Yesterday was the longest day of the year but the night was wild. Huge gusts of wind roaring and bursting against the fabric of the building all night. It kept coming and going, one minute silence, the next, ferocious sound. No wonder the walls needed to be solid. I wonder why anyone would build a village here at all and what they did to survive. The ground looks pretty inhospitable. At 3am unearthly light from an almost full moon lit up the swelling silky sea. I didn’t get much sleep. This morning the weather forecast said the winds had been between 100 and 120 km per hour! It is bright and sunny now but very blowy. Lots of white horses.

I walked down the hill and suddenly it was like I had been walking around with my eyes closed. So mesmerised by the phenomenal views out to sea I had completely missed the gaggle of derelict cottages at the entrance to the village. Some had wooden window frames and one had a wooden floor, rotting but evident. There were fireplaces with huge wooden beams supporting the chimney and one had a circle of stones in the back room with a well at the centre, a laundry perhaps.

I returned to the broken buildings with graphite and paper and did drawings and rubbings of surfaces. Returning to the studio I started drawing in earnest using the rubbings and marks as source material. By late afternoon I had finished two drawings and two tiny paintings. I think I know where I am going now – well for today anyway.

Now, outside, it is almost still. Yellow headed gannets are floating like catamarans on the late evening air and a cormorant has somewhere to get to before dark.