COP26 (the UN Climate Change Conference) is happening this year in Glasgow and now that GoMA has re-opened our first collection exhibition – Drink in the Beauty – will explore representations of landscape, geology, and human intervention.  

Our Learning Assistant, Sarah, is recommending the anthology edited by Kathleen Jamie, Antlers of Water, a collection of stories and experiences that ties in perfectly with our support to the vital fight and that of museums around the world. #unityforbiodiversity 

‘ The first time I came to Scotland I was 16 years old. I only started working in the local “Tabac” and could finally afford to pay for the yearly scholar trip scheduled with my English class. This year, the trip was a 10-day drive up to Scotland from the French Alps where I’m from, in a coach filled with students and teachers, road tripping (if we can call it that) all the way up the East Coast of Scotland.As a teenager then, I honestly didn’t have high expectations. Being from the Alps, I grew up surrounded by picturesque scenery of mountains and lakes. I couldn’t imagine that anywhere else could equalise or surpass it. I was in for a big surprise.

I remember passing the Scottish border and being mesmerised by how hilly and green it was. From lochs to turquoise beaches, from bothies to castles, from cliffs to islands, the scenery was forever changing. What a spectacle. 

“We invite you to read not as passive recipient, but as an active participant in this vital work, this noticing. If by reading you are encouraged or confirmed in your love of the natural world, if your interest is piqued, then our job is done. When we read and write, when we love our fellow creatures, when we walk on the beach, when we just listen and notice, we are not little cogs in the machine, but part of the remedy.” 

Introduction by Kathleen Jamie

Antlers of Water, a modern anthology of Scottish nature writing, really shows and express through words, poetry, visual art, photography and prose, the wonders of Scotland’s landscapes I am now lucky to live within.  

This collection of stories celebrates wonderful places in Scotland but also highlights and cares for the environment, the politics, and the climate crisis. This anthology will take you wild swimming, birdwatching, even waspwatching, out on a wind farm in a moor, through myths and legends and out to the islands. ‘

“ANTHROPOCENE: us being too much for everything else” 

From a place-aware dictionary by Alec Finlay