Móti member Megumi Barrington has been researching and making work along with the Orkney Japan Association for two sister exhibitions in the Orkney International Science Festival, ‘Surf and Turf’ at The Ship of Fools Gallery Kirkwall and ‘Mother of the Sea’ at Northlight Gallery in Stromness.

Three exhibitions are woven together in the gallery near the harbour front. ‘Mother of the Sea’ was inspired by the work of Dr Kathleen Drew Baker (1901-1957), revered in Japan for her work on the life cycle of the seaweed known in Wales as laver (Japanese nori). It will include a varied mix of artists who work with seaweed in printmaking, photography, painting, textiles and sculpture and is spread between here and the Northlight Gallery in Stromness.

It will also include showings of three films. Seaweed by Julia Parks weaves together voices of seaweed harvesters and alginate workers today with archive footage and folklore amidst scenes from northern beaches and the ever-present background of the sea. Umi No Oya by Maya Minder and Ewen Chardronnet highlights the importance of Kathleen Drew-Baker’s research for the nori industry in Japan and shows some of the effects of climate change on seaweed farming. The third film, Homo Photosyntheticus: Interview with Yamamoto Takihiro, features the 7th generation head of the Yamamoto Noriten Company, founded in 1849.

‘A Fragile Correspondence’ was commissioned by Scotland + Venice to bring writers, artists and architects together to look at language and landscape. It journeys from the forests around Loch Ness to Orkney’s seashore and the vanished Orkney Norn language, to the industrialised remnants of the Ravenscraig steelworks.

Earthbound Orkney

‘Earthbound Orkney’ features techniques of building in earth and stone in the Orcadian Neolithic.