The Boat in the Writing Room: retracing the origins of Stonypath, Little Sparta

On Thursday 20th November, GSA exhibitions are hosting a special screening of ‘The Boat in the Writing Room: retracing the origins of Stonypath, Little Sparta’, in the Reid Lecture Theatre from 6pm. Free but ticketed – book via Eventbrite here

‘The Boat in the Writing Room’ is a new documentary film about the year Ian Hamilton Finlay (1925 – 2006) and his family spent at Gledfield Farmhouse, Sutherland, Scotland, 1965-66. This proved to be a transformational phase, now almost forgotten, in the early career of the Scottish poet, artist and landscape designer.

This special screening has been programmed to coincide with the centenary exhibition Ian Hamilton Finlay – War and Pieces of a Garden, on show in the Garnethill Gallery until the 22nd November. Following the screening, there will be a short Q&A with writer and presenter Alistair Peebles.

The film features contributions from Sue Swan, early collaborators Michael Hamish Glen and Peter Lyle, and not least Professor Stephen Bann, Finlay’s friend and “preferred commentator”. The film evokes in detail the Gledfield era and demonstrates its significance as a transitional phase in Finlay’s career.

The year Finlay and his family spent at Gledfield represented a crucial stage between his concrete poems on the page and his three-dimensional works. Successful in their own right, these showed the way towards later work at Little Sparta, and also helped prompt his move towards classicism. It was at Gledfield too that he and his partner Sue Finlay (now Swan) first began gardening.