Each year The Cromarty Arts Trust provides month-long residencies for artists to live and work in the community. In 2006 Cromarty was privileged to welcome Hanna Tuulikki, whose project ‘Airs of the Sea’ chimed with the aims of our 2007 project. Here are some extracts from her project diary.

…This afternoon I walked to the top of the hill they call The Sutor. On either side the sea glistened and as the sun drew closer to the water it lit a path of gold. The distant waves rippled silver and the strange oil rigs seemed to lose their ominous presence. The sky is so vast here with grey and white clouds that expand in patterns across the blue.

…For over 700 years Cromarty’s livelihood has depended on its proximity to the sea. The sea here is a guardian providing work for fishermen, tradesmen and more recently for the extracting of oil. The sea is a powerful mother, a repository of our deepest fears and aspirations. I want to work with the ideas of the sea because of how it has shaped Cromarty and its people.

…The rhythm of our breath parallels the rhythm of the waves. As I sit upon the rocks on the shore I breathe in the sea air and the sound of the water. The wave lifts and rises up towards the land and breaks. I breathe out. It draws near and with the mass of sea behind, is pulled back again. I breathe in.

…The breathing waves are continuous, a constant sound that lived long before the tides of traffic sound that dominate today’s soundscape. But the rhythms and pitches of the sea change, as do the voices. That is, the harmony created by many voices that rise and fall, water on water and water on land.

…An idea for a piece to work on here has been growing: a sound piece replicating the sounds of the sea and the waves lapping the shore. The materials for this will be the breaths/voices of the local community.

…This morning I was up early to visit MacFarquhar’s Bed. The huge archway is a mouth into the sea, nature’s own palace. Barnacles covering the surface of the rocks hissed quietly as the water evaporated, a big black shag swooped past, its massive wings beating the air loudly and a pair of terns chattered playfully. The sea was calm, the water almost still as if patiently waiting for something. I put my headphones on and placed my microphone on one of the rocks jutting out into the water. The water began to swell on either side of the rock and in both ears the waves moved backwards and forwards in and out of sync with one another.

…As I stare out at the North Sutor the evening rays fall softly on to the distant form, accentuating its curves and crevices. For a moment it takes on human form and the rounded hollow now cast in shadow becomes its mouth. As the yellow sun vanishes it takes its final breath and dusk turns the giant back to rock.

…I have begun to understand the recordings of people’s breath as self-portraits from the inside – the most intimate thing I can ask of somebody. I have been collecting 100 different breaths from across the community in Cromarty. From these I have sculpted a sound piece imitating the sounds of the sea and the rhythms of the waves.

[Drawn portraits of the participants were also exhibited as part of Hanna’s installation.]

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