HesiTate kelty

Celie Byrne

HesiTate: bringing colour to the community during the lock down.

 My home has been the old mining village of Kelty for the last 26 years in deepest, darkest Fife. The surrounding area is a mix of landscaped woodland and industrial history. Kelty itself is now a little street art hot spot, which I like to call ‘Murals in the Rurals’ (thanks to Jo Richardson for that title!). There are over 20 hand painted public artworks, created by the Kelty Street Art team; myself, Donna Forrester, Vanessa Gibson and Ben Gibson, making up the small group of artists bringing colour to the village we call home. I have to say that sunny Kelty has a wealth of talent on its doorstep. 

 With that in mind and having all scheduled work put on indefinite hold, artists Mark Small and Carl Smyth had an idea to create a public art piece for their gardens in Cupar and asked me to do the same. HesiTate KELTY was installed and on show in my garden to bring a pop of colour and hopefully a smile as people walked their dogs or took their daily exercise during the first lockdown. 

 Under normal circumstances I may see 3 dog walkers in a day, but in these unprecedented times I counted 30 in an hour. Very unusual considering I’m off the beaten track. There was a sense of adventure in the air from the locals as they strolled by. Some even stopped to chat and asked what on earth I was doing, even getting a photo taken with ‘VERA’ and ‘LYNN’, two sets of legs from ex display shop floor models. 

 There’s the old outhouse where I stored materials from previous projects that I raked through for potential pieces to reimagine for the installation. I found chairs, a bit of wooden panel from a cupboard, a glazed picture frame as well as masonry and spray paints. 

 Every day I was out working at least a handful of people stopped to ask questions, engage in the moment and which subsequently allowed us to get to know each other a little bit more. 

You don’t have to be an artist to do the same in the street where you live. Paint an old chair, hang a painting from your tree or just brighten up an old plant pot.