Idleness and the Dreamer was exhibited in a solo exhibition at Bonhoga Gallery, Shetland 2004. Idleness and the Dreamer was made with the support of  an award from the Hope Scott Trust and the Shetland Arts Trust.

Idleness and the Dreamer

Idleness and the Dreamer is a latter-day camera obscura, the evocation of an enclosed garden on the darkened walls of grain loft in a former barley mill in Weisdale, Shetland. A painted panorama of atmospheric phenomena, of light on water, and a digital video projection recalling the structural elements of a garden for the practice of courtly love: a fountain, a bench, a tree and a walk.

The 13th century poem “The Romance of the Rose” is the recollection of a poet undertaking a dream walk to a walled garden. Here he meets with the virtues and vices of the medieval tradition and the ultimate object of his wandering, the Rose. At the entrance to the garden the poet, the Dreamer, is met by the allegorical figure of Idleness, a woman whose sole purpose is that of pleasure and beauty. On entering the garden a stage is set for the formal practises of romantic love.