Arts: Edwyn Collins

Edwyn Collins’s exhibition of bird sketches* proves he’s not just one of the most formidable musicians Britain’s produced in the last 30-odd years, but a talented artist too.

Prior to founding Orange Juice in seventies, Collins had long harboured other creative ambitions. The son of an art lecturer, he originally studied to become a draftsman having obsessively sketched at school. Even when Orange Juice started to become a big name, Collins still held strong aspirations of reinterpreting the works of early-twentieth-century draughtsman, Archibald Thorburn.

Sadly, though, his commitment to Orange Juice and his subsequent solo career put pay to any such desires, and art sunk into the background as Edwyn became a musical icon. But in 2005 Collins’s life changed forever: he suffered a brain haemorrhage and was left incapable of playing guitar. Months of intensive therapy lay ahead to help him regain his motor skills. During this period, Edwyn rediscovered his passion for drawing, and began producing a sketch of a bird everyday, complete with date and signature.

Collins’s exhibition is a rare opportunity for fans and art lovers to experience his previously unknown talents. As a collection of documents, they explore his extraordinary recovery via art, which recently led him to release an album, Home Again, on Heavenly Records. Whatever your interests, it surely won’t fail to provide a unique insight into the musician’s abilities and life.

Edwyn Collins: British Birdlife
The Smithfield Gallery
16 West Smithfield
London
EC1A 9HY
October 21 – November 1, 2008
thesmithfieldgallery.com
Tel: 020 7489 7550

Lesser Black-Backed Gull, Larus Fuscus
Identification: 21”. About the size of a Herring Gull; much smaller than a Great Black-backed, from which distinguished by yellow legs; British form L. f. graellsii has slate-grey upper-parts.
Voice: A repeated, strident “kyow”; anxiety note when breeding, a dry “gah-gah-gah”; also varied mewing, barking and laughing notes.
Habitat: Coasts, estuaries, waters and fields often far inland. Breeds, usually colonially, on rocky cliffs islands, beaches, occaisionally in marshes.

Little Egret, Egretta Garzetta
Identification: 22”. A small snow white heron with a black bill, black legs and yellow feet, latter conspicuous in flight.
Voice: In breeding season, a croaking “kark” and a bubbling “wulla-wulla-wulla”.
Habitat: Marshes, lagoons, swamps. Nests in colonies, often with other herons, in bushes or trees, in wet marsh, swamps, dry open country and woods.

Dotterel, Charadrius Morinellus
Identification: 8.5”. Male smaller. Very tame. Distinguished by white band between brown breast and orange-chestnut under parts, and blackish crown with very broad white eye stripes, joining in distinctive “V” on nape. Belly black.
Voice: A repeated, piping “titi-ri-titi-ri”, becoming a rapid trill.
Habitat: Stony heights and tundra; on migration on lowland heaths, marshes and coasts. Breeds on bare high ground.

Moorhen, Gallinula Chloropus
Identification: 13”. A stout blackish bird of pond margins. Distinguished from Coot by smaller size, red frontal sheild and bill, latter with yellow tip, bold irregular white streak across flanks and conspicuous white under tail-coverts with black centre stripe. Legs green, with red “garter” above joint.
Voice: A harsh penetrating “kr-r-rk” or “kittick,” etc.
Habitat: Ponds, slow streams, marshes, sewage farms and adjacent meadows. Nests in reeds and bushes near water, occaisionaly in trees and old nests of other species. Lately on canals using plastic bags and other detritus on rivers.

Snipe, Egretta Garzetta
Identification: 10”. A secretive, tight-sitting, brown marsh bird, with a long, straight bill. Black and rufous back strongly striped with conspicuous white. Pale stripes on head are lengthways (Woodcocks are across). Long slender bill carried downwards in flight. Flies to feeding grounds at dusk in small parties, or “wisps.”
Voice: When flushed, a dry rasping “schape.” Song, a clock-like, monotonously repeated “chic-ka.”
Habitat: Marshes, water meadows, sewagefarms, boggy moors, etc. Nests in coarse grass or rushes, occaisionally in heather.

Related: