The Heart of Stromness, Stories My Mother Told Me will be launched on Friday 17 November 6 -9 pm at the Northlight Gallery at Graham Place in Stromness.

Kathleen Leith nee Leask was born at 6 Graham Place in 1928. Her childhood stories paint a colourful picture of Stromness.

Her daughter Patricia Long has put those tales into black and white and Jeanne Bouza Rose and Stephanie Long have added the colour.

Come and visit Stromness and walk the cobbled street visiting all the galleries and the Pier Arts Centre for their first late night holiday opening on 17 November.

Patricia and Jeanne met more than 10 years ago and Jeanne has lived in Stromness for the past 7 years so a lot of stories have been exchanged about their respective childhoods. Jeanne laughed at many of the adventures Kathleen got into as a child and found them an interesting idea to illustrate.

There was also beauty in the houses along the streets where the stories were set. Over the years, both Patricia and her daughter Stephanie took Jeanne’s print workshop and more stories were shared over the artwork, so it seemed natural that some kind of collaboration would eventually take place.

This year of Per Mare celebrations helped to push Patricia and Jeanne into action, to get the book written and illustrated. The original woodblocks and their partnered original  watercolour  white-line woodcuts that were made for the book will only be on exhibition and sale at the Northlight Exhibition which will be open from 11 to 4 on 18 – 23 November.

This is the first time that Jeanne will be selling off the original woodblocks, thus making it impossible to create another original print image. This is truly a one time opportunity.

From its very beginning, Stromness has always looked outwards to the wider world so it seems very apt that Orcadians and a New Yorker have worked together on this book. The illustrations are prints using a form of printmaking considered the only North American contribution to the craft of printmaking and the stories capture a very particular time and place in Orkney.

For more information contact:
Jeanne Rose Jeanne@artworksoftheearth.com 07900982612
Patricia Long Pat@aboutorkney.co.uk 851 172