PORTFOLIO - Nicki MacRae

A timeline of work…

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nicki_macrae

Life & Creative Practice ~ Living with neurological disability
Art / Scottish Highlands / History / Vintage / Mudlarking / Fungi / Disabled Hiker

A crate of rubbish that we managed to clear off th

A crate of rubbish that we managed to clear off the beach last night...

I found the fishing tray in the shore-side undergrowth and thought it might make a ‘trash sledge’ to cart stuff out, but it didn’t really work out 😂🤦‍♀️. Instead we ended up with a huge box to awkwardly carry 😂. We’ll keep the crate and use it for shed / finds / garden storage, and properly dispose / recycle everything else ☺️.

My theory on clearing beach trash…

1) It makes the beach nicer for the next person. The next person might be you 👍

2) With a lot of the beach junk you find, if it’s left, it gets worse (like nylon twine and polystyrene breaking up into micro plastics), or it disappears (playing tug of war with sand-buried rope, lightweight plastic packaging blowing out to sea, etc) so the sooner, the better really.

3) If another beach-user sees you clearing up, it might encourage them in their litter picking efforts (or at least not to drop any) 🤷‍♀️.

4) It definitely gets you points with the Beach Gods to then *cash in* for finds of awesome cool stuff for your mudlarking / beachcombing collection👌👍😉

5) If you don’t find any historical, beautiful or otherwise interesting mudlarking / beachcombing treasure on your trip, you don’t have to feel sad - the trip wasn’t a waste of your time 🤷‍♀️. If you removed some modern rubbish, you can still feel accomplished as you head home ☺️.

#LiveLifeInTechnicolour
#StayCurious

[Image Description: A series of photos of a big, white fishing tray filled with beach debris - plastic rope, packaging, tennis ball, bits of synthetic fabric, etc. a man & woman, both white and in their 40s, wearing hiking clothes stand on a Scottish beach on a grey evening, the man is holding a litter picking stick & the woman looks tired but is smiling. The box is seen nearly filling the boot of a car.]

#MudLarkingFinds #Mudlarks #Mudlarking #RiverFinds #MudlarkingUK #BeachcombingFinds #Beachcomber #Beachcombing #ScottishBeachFinds #2MinuteBeachClean #LitterPicking #KeepBritainTidy #SaveOurSeas #BeachClean #PlasticFreeCoastlines #SaveOurOceans #Upcycle #PlasticPollution #BeTheSolution #CleanerSeas

Please take a deep breath, inhale the salt air and

Please take a deep breath, inhale the salt air and enjoy a 2 minute celebration of the BEAUTY of the Scottish coastline (crafted from some of my best clips over the last 3 years…) 😍🥰👌

#LiveLifeInTechnicolour
#StayCurious

[Video description: A montage of images of beaches and coastline from around the Highlands of Scotland. Text reads ‘The Sea’ over an image dappled light on deep blue ocean. A tiny, quiet cove sits under a tall white and red stripped lighthouse. A small fishing boat chugs into port. Big sculptural clouds reflect onto glistening mudflats. Bright, golden grasses wave in front of a stark, slate grey sky that promises an imminent downpour. The camera pans through a sweeping vista of complex coastline comprising sun-illuminated inlets, headlands, tree cover, mountains and islands. An unseen hand twirls a black and white feather in front of a view of ice-coloured waves and a snow covered headland. Orange tinged waves roll in in slow motion under a fiery sky. Sunsets of every colour and intensity flick by in quick succession. Sea birds circle in front of cliffs that are part-hidden by sea mist. Waves pull back to reveal bright crimson sand. A blonde white woman wearing sunglasses wobbles slightly with poor balance as she leans on her hiking pole walking whilst through sea caves. A white male hand shakes white groatie buckie shells. A winter sunset colours the sea and whole shore a deep red. The camera pans over lapping waves to show the words again ‘The Sea. Scottish Highlands’.]

#HighlandsOfScotland #ScottishHighlands #HighlandsScotland #Insta_Scotland #ScotlandsBeauty #ScotlandLover #ScotlandLove #ExploreScotland #LoveScotland #BonnieScotland #UnlimitedScotland #Seascapes #ThisIsScotland #ScotlandExplore #ScottishWanderlust #WildScotland #OutdoorsLover #BeachLife #CoastalLiving #CoastalPhotography #CoastalLife #CoastalVibes #CoastalViews #Mudlarker #Mudlarking #Beachcomber #Beachcombing #ScottishBeaches

Yesterday on the shore, in glorious sun and coolin

Yesterday on the shore, in glorious sun and cooling winds. Shuffling slowly forward, side-by-side with a friend who equally delights in found objects… a splodgy flower on a Spongeware shard, the luxurious smoothness of a jasper pebble, hand-forged boat nails corroding into abstract forms. Bartering and trading finds… this metal find for you, this ceramic find in return. Mysteries in the form of brass and glass. Seabirds calling, scots pines swaying, bees humming. Minds lost in gentle chatter and earthward observation, present in the moment whilst exploring the past.

Thank you for a lovely day @janeo9364 😍🥰👌✨

#LiveLifeInTechnicolour
#StayCurious

[Image Description: a white woman in hiking clothes is seen from behind. Her head is crooked and she’s looking downward. She grips a hiking pole for support in one hand (her mobility aid) and a litter picker stick in the other. To one side are breeze blown grasses, tall scots pines and an old stone-built boathouse, to the other a pebbly shore, blue water and beyond that, the verdant green of distant farmlands.]

#SeaPottery #MaterialHistory #MudlarkingCeramics #MudLarkingFinds #Mudlarks #Mudlarking #RiverFinds #MudlarkingUK #BeachcombingFinds #Beachcomber #SeaTreasures #Beachcombing #ScottishBeachFinds #HistoryOnTheBeach #BeachTreasure #BeachFinds #ScottishBeaches #Beachcomber #MudlarkingWoman #MudlarkingScotland #HistoryLover #HistoryLovers #HistoryHunter #HistoryHunters #SavingHistory #TreasureHunting #TreasureHunt #HistoryHunting

ABSTRACT ART inspired by MUDLARKED CERAMICS and GE

ABSTRACT ART inspired by MUDLARKED CERAMICS and GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS ||

Something I’ve been working on as a digital abstract painting project, inspired by two things…

The first is combed and swirled slipware ceramic shards found my myself and other mudlarks (I don’t get the combed type of slipware decoration here, but it’s common elsewhere and I’ve found myself drawing it a lot).

Image 2 & 3 show combed slip wares from the V&A collection. Image 4 shows a couple of swirled and mottled slipware shards that I’ve personally found.

The second inspiration is my trip over to the West Coast a few weeks ago, and the swirled and layered rocks there. With sorting processes going on within layers of rock, making distinct bands, layering of different rock types and intrusions of other rock coming in and interrupting these patterns.

Photos 5 & 6 show examples of these rock formations along the roadside between Scourie & Laxford.

#LiveLifeInTechnicolour
#StayCurious

#MudlarkingArt #SeaPottery #MudlarkingCeramics #MudLarkingFinds #BeachcombingFinds #ScottishBeachFinds #Mudlark #Beachcomber #MudlarkingScotland #TodaysArtReport #FlamingAbstracts #DigitalPainter #AbstractPaintings #AbstractArtist #abstractart_daily #WomenInArt #ArtistsWithDisabilities #CreativityMatters #AbstractPainting #Abstracted #DigitalPainting #DigitalArt #DigitalAbstract #ProcreateArt #DigitalArtists #AbstractDigital #AbstractAddict #AbstractOGram

A pocket full of pretty green… marbles, bottle s

A pocket full of pretty green… marbles, bottle stoppers transferware, hotel ware, bits of Victorian tile…
#MudlarkingFinds

#LiveLifeInTechnicolour
#StayCurious

[Image Description: a close-up shot of pottery shards in shades of green and white, cream or buff, decorated with stripes, foliage, geometric patterns, pictorial scenes, etc. scattered around them are several sea-worn marbles and bottle stoppers made of green-tinted glass. ]

#SeaPottery #MaterialHistory #MudlarkingCeramics #MudLarkingFinds #Mudlarks #Mudlarking #RiverFinds #MudlarkingUK #BeachcombingFinds #Beachcomber #SeaTreasures #Beachcombing #ScottishBeachFinds #HistoryOnTheBeach #BeachTreasure #BeachFinds #ScottishBeaches #Beachcomber #MudlarkingWoman #MudlarkingScotland #FlatlayArt #Transferware #TransferwareChinaPottery #HistoryLovers #HistoryHunter #SavingHistory #HistoryHunting

This is my new friend… It’s a juvenile (I th

This is my new friend…

It’s a juvenile (I think) jackdaw and he’s been hanging out with me all last week…

I keep telling him off for making a racket on the studio roof (clatter, clatter, clatter). If you want to see a few of our daily interactions, swipe).

He makes a lot of noise, but if I talk to him he stops listens intently…

We have a large number of jackdaws that live here year-round in our locality. It’s not the gulls you have to watch here with your picnic in the garden, it’s the jackdaws! They nest every year in the tallest trees around the house, and often in our chimneys 🤦‍♀️.

It’s not my imagination, by the way, about the interactions - studies by Cambridge zoologist Auguste von Bayern concluded that jackdaws respond to human expressions. They recognise human faces and can even follow human eye contact that indicates hidden food.

Clever kids… just don’t poop on my studio roof! ✋😂

#LiveLifeInTechnicolour
#StayCurious

[Image Description:
Looking up into blue skies and clouds. The edge of the transparent roof of a building forms a diagonal across the image. On it is a silhouetted figure of a bird, poking its head over the edge. Video Description: A bird is seen in a transparent roof, both from outside and underneath, as a living shaky shape. It seems to cock its head, listen and make eye contact.]

#AllNatureShots #Nature_Brilliance #Nature_Obsession #nature_hub #Nature_Seekers #Nature_Perfection #NatureAddict #NatureLover #NatureOnly #NaturePhoto #NatureCaptures #NaturePerfection

Happy Summer Solstice I was feeling a bit lost,

Happy Summer Solstice

I was feeling a bit lost, but the sea kissed it better x

(so I brought a little of it back for you too, if you need it ☺️).

#LiveLifeInTechnicolour
#StayCurious

[Video Description: A view across the sea from the shore. One shade of blue faded into another across tonally flat colour shifts - a delicate celadon blue fades through sky into sea, and down to meet swirling buff sands. The horizon is a thin sliver like the pale flash of a steel blade where muted sunlight filters under a haa-like bank of heavy cloud. Instead of disparate elements, the whole vista seems connected and united in a visual harmony. The waves ebb with a steady rhythm that echos this peaceful symmetry.]

#Mindfulness #MentalHealthMatters HighlandsOfScotland #ScottishHighlands #HighlandsScotland #Insta_Scotland #ScotlandsBeauty #ScotlandLover #ScotlandLove #LoveScotland #BonnieScotland #UnlimitedScotland #Epic_Scotland #Seascapes #ThisIsScotland #ScotlandExplore #BeachTherapy #BeachLover #ScottishBeaches #TheGreatOutdoors #GreetTheOutdoors #Outdoorsy #LifeOutdoors #OutdoorsLife #GetOutside #Mudlarking #CoastalLiving #BeachCombing #Beachcomber

I dug through a drawer of old ink drawings in the

I dug through a drawer of old ink drawings in the studio, as I had an idea about adding stones to create additional elements to abstract compositions (why I was sorting all the rocks ☺️).

I’m still playing, but I like how this turned out… ☺️

It’s funny, as you get older, how many disparate elements and bits of life experiences get pulled into one piece of work or series… Here I can see traces of beachcombing / mudlarking activity, coastal living, abstract expressionism, time spent in Japan / admiring Japanese culture, artwork I did as a visiting artist on archaeological digs, the influence of the work of land artists like Andy Goldworthy (who I studied as a teen), mindfulness / meditation practice, and adaption to new ways of working after illness / brain injury (liking options for impermanent marks that I can change my mind about and replace)…

#LiveLifeInTechnicolour
#StayCurious

[Image description: a piece of slightly cockled, cream paper bears a single broad, black ink mark - a swooping curling line that tails off to the left in a lyrical sweep. Placed around it are 5 pebbles of yellow, black and white rock, two very graphic in their make up - one specked, and one with diagonally split between black and white. They act like full stops in the composition, attracting attention and diverting the flow of visual lines. Much of the paper is left intentionally bare to allow the composition to breathe. The ink mark is vaguely reminiscent of brush calligraphy - writing without language.]

#WorkOnPaper #WorksOnPaper #ArtOnPaper #ContemporaryPainting #Abstraction #ArtForTheSoul #TodaysArtReport #FlamingAbstracts #AbstractPaintings #AbstractArtist #abstractart_daily #ContemporaryArtwork #ArtistsWithDisabilities #CreativityMatters #AbstractPainting #PaintDaily #Abstracted #NatureInspired #AbstractAddict #AbstractOGram #Pebbles #GeologyRocks #PebblesArt #Beachcomber #BeachcombingFinds #Beachcombing #BeachFinds #MudlarkingArt

Visual Dad Joke 🤭🫣 On the road North out of

Visual Dad Joke 🤭🫣

On the road North out of Laxford, on the West Coast, there are several large slabs of roadside rock - cliffs that were created when the A838 road was blasted to allow two-way traffic in the 1980s (you can see how the rock was removed by the remains of the long vertical drill holes where charges were placed, making stripes in the cliff face). These cuttings accidentally showcased the cool geological formations of the area, with seemingly three (but in actuality, more) different coloured rocks cutting into each other - black amphibolites, grey gneiss and pink pegmatite all forming giant patterns of layering, folding, then layer intrusions. Absolutely beautiful! 😍😍😄👌

Quite often you’ll drive by to see big groups of geology students gathered in the lay-bys opposite, looking glassy-eyed, whilst their tour leader lectures them about metamorphic rocks and igneous dykes 😂.

Without Scotlands amazing geology we wouldn’t have our spectacular Highland scenery, scattered picturesque communities, lochs, firths and beautiful mountains to climb. Rocks do indeed ROCK 🤘.

#LiveLifeInTechnicolour
#StayCurious

[Image Description: A white man in hiking clothes stands back to the camera in front of cliffs that fill the rest of the frame. The rock is a steely blue with masses of layering and texture, and further stripes of a darker rock that has intruded into it. Making a kind of tartan that might be created by a drunk weaver. The man holds an arm in the air, with a closed fist but with his 1st and 4th fingers pointing up, making a ‘rock’ gesture. Rock against a wall of rock - as if to say ‘rocks rock’.]

#GeologyRocks #HighlandsOfScotland #ScottishHighlands #HighlandsScotland #ScotlandGrammer #Insta_Scotland #ScotlandsBeauty #ScotlandLover #ScotlandLove #ExploreScotland

The story of a spent bullet - and, weirdly, how it

The story of a spent bullet - and, weirdly, how it could be the most valuable thing we’ve ever found on the shore 🤷‍♀️ #Mudlarking

(I kept holding-off posting about bullet finds - violent events, war… It never seems a good time to be talking with interest about a find of this type)

This bullet (or rather ‘cartridge’, as my son, who is interested in military history, keeps correcting me - thanks to him for this research ☺️) is one we found back in the Winter.

It’s a .461 No2 Gibbs of a type made from the 1890’s on-, designed to be filled with cordite & fired from the Gibbs–Farquharson–Metford rifle - of which, only 1000 were ever made, the last in 1910.

Sadly one of the main uses of these rifles was in big game hunting - rhinos, elephants, lions. Recommendation by the prominent Victorian explorer & hunter Frederick Selous did much to popularise this model. Today these rifles are avidly collected, reaching £1000s at auction.

This initial research led me to question - who would be firing a gun like this near a relatively remote Scottish beach?

The obvious candidate would be the 4th Duke of Sutherland, who inherited the title in 1892, along with Dunrobin Castle, which is just a couple of km’s along the coast from where we picked up this bullet (he also owned the land around the find site).

As was fashionable at the time, the Duke was a keen hunter (pic 4 shows the him on safari in Sudan in 1921). Pic 5 shows the castle museum, including trophy taxidermy collected by various members of the family. In pic 6 you can see various old guns amongst the many items sold last year in the Dunrobin Castle ‘attic sale’ at Bonhams. Swipe again for the castle itself.

Perhaps the Duke (or one of his guests) was using his ‘big safari gun’ to stalk stags at the edge of the woods, missed and left the spent cartridge on the shore?

What REALLY surprised me during this research though was that (cleaned & polished) used cartridges like this are collected, and ours could be worth £100 (due to rarity). Easily making it the most valuable thing we’ve ever picked up on the shore 🤷‍♀️ (though it’s intriguing history is it’s value to us).

#LiveLifeInTechnicolour
#StayCurious

Lichen on a rock, illuminated by the last light of

Lichen on a rock, illuminated by the last light of the day.

(taken earlier in the year - it doesn’t really get dark here at this time of year 😂)

By the way, thank you all for the amazing, generous, just generally lovely comments / messages on my last post… 😍🙏 please don’t think me ungrateful or tardy, I’m just trying to get back to everyone (bit broken today) ☺️👍

#LiveLifeInTechnicolour
#StayCurious

[Image Description: A macro photo of the upper surface of a grey boulder showing extensive lichen in the form of tens of small, low ‘buttons’, each with a central darker, textured area. The grey of the lichen matches the boulder. Low warm light illuminates them.]

#Lichen #Macro_Captures_ #MacroNature #MacroCreativePictures #MacroGrammers #AllNatureShots #Nature #Nature_Brilliance #Nature_Obsession #nature_hub #Nature_Seekers #Nature_Perfection #NatureAddict #NatureLover #NatureOnly #NaturePhoto

MENTAL HEALTH and creativity (sound on for voiceov

MENTAL HEALTH and creativity (sound on for voiceover) ||

Like any other human, I get down sometimes… but yesterday it really hit me - all the things I can’t do anymore (drive a car, have a job, climb a mountain, drink, sing, run my own schedule, go out on my own without help, plan ahead, have a day without pain, multitask, do crowds & noise, etc) 😰.

Low mood makes me feel out of control 🌪 (and then things can easily spiral from there, my injured brain likes to run intrusive thoughts on loops), so I find it’s helpful to *do* something (however small) that feels like it wrestles back some tiny bit of control or personal agency, that opens some wiggle room so I don’t feel so trapped in my feelings... I think this could be true for anyone, regardless of having a brain injury. Sometimes it’s the hardest, but most important thing ❤️.

On this occasion I thought I’d try combining some re-bonding with lost thoughts (remembering the things I’ve recently enjoyed) with art (it always boosts me to create) ☺️

If you’re wondering how I remember things that I’ve forgotten doing - good call! 👍😂 I keep a visual diary on my phone that covers a lot (but not all) of what I do each day. Without my phone, photos, notes, tracking apps, databases, lists, etc I’d be utterly lost. And to loose even a few of your memories / facts / stats can be like loosing a big chunk of yourself 🤷‍♀️.

You really get the best of me on Instagram, as I take time (normally days, via a planning app) to slowly piece together posts. Comments and replies don’t have to be spur of the moment, I think carefully & often pre-type what I want to say ☺️. On the fly, face-to- face, I just can’t *reliably* recall or make flowing small talk. *Reliably* is important, as it’s often the *self doubt* that ‘gets you’ more than the forgetfulness (‘hang on, did *I* say that or am I parroting something from a book? Now I feel like an idiot’).

Anyway I made a little abstract digital painting, it was ok, not brilliant… but that’s by-the-by! The whole process made me feel lighter & happier 👌. Not instantly better, but a little better able to cope 👍

#LiveLifeInTechnicolour
#MentalHealthMatters

[Video ID in comm’ts]

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