Listen to CATHY DUNCAN:

Swifts return every year to nest in the eaves of our house. Harbinger of summer, it beings me great joy so see them scything through the sky, their acrobatic flight and speed exhilarating, accompanied by their wild screeches echoing around our garden. I can’t wait to see them again this year. As Ted Hughes writes in his poem “Swifts “

…“They’ve made it again,
Which means the globe’s still working, the Creation’s
Still waking refreshed, our summers
Still all to come-“…

Cathy has chosen the Swift as the subject of her Linocut print for “Endless forms , most beautiful”. The number or swifts migrating each year to Britain is in decline. So she considers herself extremely lucky to have swifts nesting in the eaves of her house every summer and can’t wait for their return this year.

This Northern Print exhibition is inspired by Bestiaries and Herbaria and the Common Swift( Apus apus) is a fitting bird to be included in such a compendium. Country folk called it “The Devil’s Bird”, probably because of its dark plumage, speed of flight and the shrieks it emits as it flies in groups like phantoms around trees and buildings. But also here and in other countries it is associated with hope, steadfastness, grace, beauty and freedom as it spreads its wings to explore new horizons but returns every year to nest in the UK.

Cathy was influenced stylistically by the images from Medieval Bestiaries to design the print with the simple forms of the Swifts circling above a dreamlike representation of her view across her garden towards the Tyne Valley.

Artist Gallery

Cathy Duncan

Cathy Duncan is a Linocut artist with a studio at The Hearth Horsley. She lives near Hexham and took up Linocut printing about 15 years ago. She has, as a mature student, a BA in Art and Design from Sunderland University and previously worked as a Landscape Architect. She loves drawing and her sketch books are full of observations of people, landscapes, plants and wild life. These form the bases of her designs and she prints both black and white and coloured prints. She was commissioned to do black and white prints for The Land of Oak and Iron (Gateshead, County Durham and part of Northumberland). Copies of these were used as information signs, and can now be seen at specific sites in that area. Cathy enjoyed the research into the Industrial history and ecology of the North East and delighted that her work can be found in the countryside.