Eilean, Island Paul Glazier. Black and white view to Sandray
Eilean | Island by Paul Glazier
Date: 20th August – 31st October
Time: Tuesdays and Thursdays 11am-4pm
Place: The Rockfield Centre
Cost: Free Entry
The exhibition ‘Eilean | Island’ by Paul Glazier is part of ‘Everything Flows’, a series of photography exhibitions and events between July and October in various coastal locations across Scotland.
‘Everything Flows’ is organised by Street Level Photoworks for Scotlands Year of Coasts and Waters 20/21.
Paul Glazier’s lyrical portrait of the island of Vatersay, the most southerly-inhabited island in the Outer Hebrides, includes images taken from different periods from the 1980s to the present day. Returning to the island as often as he can, he captures the changing face of the island's inhabitants and the landscape itself as time leaves its mark. Some of the children in the original photographs now have their own children and even grandchildren, and parents have become great grandparents.
The images reflect both the continuity and the changes that have occurred in this community over the past three decades. The heart of the project is the portraits, but the presence of the rugged Hebridean landscape is never far away.
Paul Glazier grew up in London and went to Goldsmiths College of London University for his degree in Fine Art, graduating in 1987. It was there that he first printed his photographs taken on Vatersay. By that time he already had a strong relationship with the island since he had been going there regularly since 1978 when he was 12 years old.
As a young teenager Glazier went back as often as possible, once or twice a year, photographing all the time. On leaving school he would travel up to the island on his own until he moved to Holland in 1994. After that his visits were more sporadic, but since 2010 his contact with the island and his friends there has been renewed and he has been visiting more regularly.
During his first visits back in the 1980s there were not so many cameras on the island, and they would only be taken out for special occasions. This means that for some people Glazier’s photographs are the only images they have of family or friends from that period. So over the years they have accrued a certain historical and nostalgic value for the islanders.
A selection of Glazier's images from 1985 was published in the photo zine Vatersay 1985 by Café Royal Books in 2016, and in 2020 Bluecoat Press published Island Tides, a lavish 168-page photobook that chronicles Glazier’s 35-year relationship with the island.
Glazier continues to photograph the people of the island and hopes to be able to chronicle the island for many years to come.
Everything Flows is a specially curated coastal exhibition trail, programmed by Street Level Photoworks in partnership with regional venues and supported by EventScotland as part of the Year of Coasts and Waters 20/21.
