‘I seek to bridge a recognisable world with that of an imaginary or mythological one. I almost always include birds as the main protagonists but have increasingly brought in human characters too. This alchemy of birds and fragments of old master figurative paintings, become vehicles for the subconscious to play and facilitate self-expression.’ Carolynda Macdonald

Working previously as a Biomedical Scientist in Microbiology, Carolynda Macdonald has progressively developed her painting practice since 1982, studying life drawing, printmaking and exhibiting extensively in the UK, USA, and Australia. Now based in Edinburgh, Macdonald’s recent exhibitions, including House of Macdonald with fellow artists Alan and Rory Macdonald, affirm her emergence as a distinctive voice in Contemporary Art. Drawing on traditions of painting in Western Art, the tradition celebrated by Macdonald is freedom of expression, art which is big enough to admit multiple layers of interpretation, making ‘paintings you can fall into.’ ‘Humanity being imprinted onto Nature’ is a strong theme in her latest work, where birds are threshold subjects, guardians of the natural world and human vulnerabilities.

River of Lost Souls (oil on linen, 113cm x 105cm) contains a scene of human betrayal, the cutting of Samson’s hair by Delilah’s accomplice, a removal of his supernatural power depicted by Rubens and reimagined here within the body of a bird. The brown, russet, crimson, and flesh tones glow humanely, emerging from a dark, cool, calm before storm background by the river’s edge. The human body is tucked protectively into the bird’s feathers, a safe space where humanity, emotion, and nature, within and without, can be examined. Poised on one leg, the bird’s gaze meets ours. This recognition, the confrontation of the eye of one species meeting another’s, is deeply arresting. It is a moment of tension that brings thought and feeling bubbling to the surface, in our immediate present and in relation to a shard of visual history.  The painting is a threshold space and being held within spaces where land, sky and water meet, have a particular role in Macdonald’s art. She composes images of sanctuary for her protagonists and the viewer, alive with tension and burgeoning consciousness, full of possibility. This feeling of potential, psychologically and in the realm of dreams, is incredibly subtle and potent. In River of Lost Souls, who or what gives us strength, is given new context out with the Old Testament Biblical story and an art historical canon of Old Male Masters.

There are a number of genres and art historical expectations in play here, and Macdonald inadvertently subverts them all, bringing fragments of grand Master subjects into intimate focus, honouring scientific enquiry and ornithological art with feeling, and bringing untold psychological depth to the traditionally demure arena of still life. The field of enquiry is truly expansive, painted with meticulous detail and devotion to craft. It is the joy of painting and not politics that drives Macdonald’s art. We are free to interpret meaning and lose ourselves in narratives of our own making- that’s the gift and flow within her painting. In the presence of an artistic voice that elevates the mind and spirit, we can confront difficult things and begin to heal. Macdonald describes the music of Jocelyn Pook, Lisa Gerrard and Portuguese Fado singing in such terms, and the same is true of her paintings.  

Carolynda Macdonald brings her microbiologist’s eye to the pattern of life and creates different spheres of awareness in the process. In Beacon of Hope (oil on board, 25cm x 23cm) we see a feast of finely painted flowers reminiscent of Rachel Ruysch within the body of a tiny wren. Although delicately rendered, the dark bird is alert, determined and poised in readiness on a natural stone, clasping a diamond in its claw. Broken jewellery is strewn at its feet, a microcosm of detail in a mountainous landscape of macrocosmic emotions and association. There is a jewellery box inheritance opened here and an uncanny, fleshly light which plays across the surface of lake and sky in the background. The artist creates an atmosphere of profound stillness, a place of solace, contemplation and in this case, an unsettling suggestion of relationships being tested. Macdonald describes the objects in her paintings being ‘broadly drawn’ rather than autobiographical. ‘Pearls are beautiful things to paint- glowing. They can abstractly solve a painting. What a pearl is, what it means’ also comes into play. ‘Pearls are a living thing, a grain of sand, giving all these things a different life in the work.’ Sometimes the placement of objects emerge unconsciously out of a brushstroke and Macdonald is simply enjoying where the mark takes her. It is an art of instinct and precision, that allows the human condition to be explored in all its nuances, ‘including inner turmoil and vulnerability, love and hidden desires, betrayal, motherhood, and protectiveness.’

The intimate scale of Macdonald’s wren and robin paintings draws you in, often with unexpected twists. In Fortress of Shadows (oil on board, 25 x 23cm) the female form is revealed and protected within the body of the bird, perched on a silver jewellery box. The strawberries in the right foreground link with drapery which the female protagonist draws towards her body to shield it, her hand resting on the wren’s head. They are both vessels of potential narratives. The vulnerability of this reclining nude pose, seen so often in Western Art History as exposure for a male gaze, shifts to a more heightened state of awareness within, as if the threat exists beyond the boundaries of the picture plane, with the painting as refuge. The way Macdonald positions the female body gives it protection and agency -within the painting and the viewer, to begin to explore what this internal scene means to us.

The Scream (oil on board, 25 x 22cm) is another powerful example, punching far above its scale and subverting the hierarchical dominance of large-scale History Painting. The combination of elements-still life, wren and jewellery, set in what feels like an 18^th Century Arcadian landscape is juxtaposed with a fragment of Goya’s resistance painting The Third of May 1808, with civilians dying before a firing squad. Perched on the lid of a jewellery box, the open-mouthed wren omits a sound, amplified by the viewer’s imagination. There is a broken, half submerged ring or tether in the water, an intriguing detail that suggests shackles being broken on multiple levels. The potency of the scream, its volume and resonance is made by association, linked to the viewer’s awareness/experience and the scene of execution. There is beauty, horror and tension in this work achieved with consummate skill. The grand history painting is a fragment on the bird’s body, perhaps suggesting the relativity of human history when staring the current Anthropocene era in the face.

Our perception of violence in The Garden of Solace (oil on linen, 134 x 124cm) is tempered by how Macdonald leads the eye into the painting. The curves of the brown flamingo’s neck and beak direct us towards a fragment of Eugène Delacroix’s Death of Sardanapalus contained within its body. The extreme violence and chaos of this scene is repositioned so that we can actually be still with it and begin to interpret what is brought to the surface. It is a very powerful thing to give freedom to the imagination, both in the act of painting and enabling the viewer. This self -reflexivity is precisely what art is for, individually and collectively, to actively process what it means to be human, how we relate to each other and the natural world. In The Garden of Solace, the indifferent male ruler at the apex of Delacroix’s original painting is absent and the curve of the female body which mirrors the form of the beak opposite becomes more present. There is a sense of compassion and vulnerability that completely transforms the aggression of the original scene. The psychology and emotional intelligence of this painting is breathtaking. It is a wonderful example of the complexity and strength of art in expressing what often cannot be voiced or contemplated anywhere else. The beauty of these works lies in Macdonald’s ability to create a safe, yet gently confrontational space for a range of different emotions and experiences to be acknowledged and felt. ‘Removing the figures from their original context and narrative gives them a new life.’ Sanctuary (oil on linen, 91cm x 64cm) may be dream like and reassuring, the heron presenting as a guardian of the three figures within, but the clouds and water, receding in tsunami-like fashion, reveal an unsettling atmosphere which the bird resiliently withstands. The fragment of art history, Solimena’s Venus at the forge of Vulcan carries its own mythology, yet the chosen fragment and trio of resting hands makes this feel like a familial scene, rather than a distant narrative of ancient deities.

There are paintings where ‘rather than keeping these human figures within the birds’, Macdonald allows ‘them to break their boundaries and occupy a space between two worlds.’ In Where Spirits Run Free (oil on linen, 91cm x 84cm) figures float off the bird’s back, into a mythic landscape and nature’s elements. There is a sense of reverie in this action and in the handling of the background which feels made of us. It belongs to the Northern Romantic tradition of beholding the landscape/ nature and all it means to us, a quality internalised in Macdonald’s art, liberating the spirit.

There is also a powerful edge in paintings such as Refuge (oil on canvas, 91 x 83cm). Here the female figure breaks free from the body of the bird, hands outstretched and gazing above, beyond the picture plane. Although we feel there is something bearing down on her, she stands securely on the bird’s back. There is love in every brushstroke and we feel we are in safe hands to unpack the unseen but palpable sense of threat. The poise of the bird and the presence of nature comforts, while the true scale of humanity can be scrutinised. There is a drive towards renewal in Macdonald’s art, a calling, like the doves in her painting Kindred Spirits (oil on linen, 113 x 105cm), ‘vulnerable things coming together in a hostile landscape who have called each other to restore.’ Crossing these imaginative thresholds, we may discover strength, resilience, and the joy of possibility within ourselves and the wider world.

Carolynda Macdonald’s work is currently on show in HOUSE OF MACDONALD, Kilmorack Gallery, Scotland, 16 March- 13 April 2024 https://www.kilmorackgallery.co.uk/exhibitions/404-house-of-macdonald-alan-macdonald-carolynda-macdonald-rory-macdonald/