Community / St Ninian’s Isle selected for national remembrance event
ARTWORK is set to be drawn into the sand on the St Ninian’s Isle beach next month as part of a nationwide Armistice Day remembrance event led by Trainspotting director Danny Boyle.
The popular beauty spot is one of six beaches in Scotland picked for the event on 11 November, which is called Pages of the Sea.
It centres around the idea of a portrait being drawn in the sand of a World War One casualty with a connection to the local community.
While the project has been created by Boyle, it is being delivered locally by National Theatre of Scotland.
The portrait will be designed by sand artists Sand In Your Eye and it will be washed away as the tide comes in.
The public will also be asked to join in by creating silhouettes of people in the sand, “remembering the millions of lives lost or changed forever by the conflict”.
Organisers have warned, however, that the scale of the sand art is weather dependent.
Individuals, families and communities are also set to read a specially commissioned poem by Carol Ann Duffy as they gather on St Ninian’s Isle and on beaches across the UK and Ireland.
The public is also encouraged to check out an online gallery of portraits of some of the men and women who served in WW1 and select someone to say a personal goodbye to either via social media or as they gather in person on beaches.
Visitors to the website can also add portraits of members of their family or community who contributed to the First World War.
National Theatre of Scotland chief executive and the project’s artistic director Jackie Wylie said: “Pages of the Sea will create an artistic tribute, both personal and communal, through art, words, pictures and stories, acknowledging all those who left our shores during WW1.”
The project has been commissioned by 14-18 NOW, the UK’s arts programme for the First World War centenary.
It also oversaw the ‘We’re here because we’re here’ project, which commemorated the start of the Battle of the Somme 100 years ago by placing people around the UK – including Shetland – dressed as fallen soldiers.
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