OUR FEATURE PRESENTATION....

There is a new weekly event in Dufftown, Tuesday night is presentation night. Loosely based on the popular television programme 'Come Dine With Me' . Each week pairs of artists compete to give the best presentation. Just like in the programme, participants are marked on hospitality and as well as content, however unlike the programme there is no large cash prize. We kicked off last week with Rhonda and Isidora both giving short presentations on their work to their resident peers and Jake, the residency mascot.

Jake the hound, performs an important role in the overall judging process as once he begins to show some signs of boredom the artist has clearly gone on too long. Like a canine Simon Cowell his restlessness quickly spreads out amongst the rest of the audience and once the collective howls have begun to drown the presenter out, its time to stop.

This week it was the turn of Hugh and Suso. Rhonda and Isidora had set the bar high the previous week despite some clear restlessness being shown on occasion by Jake, And so with the stakes high, Suso made sure his guests were able to find his house by water marking the gable end with a suitable message. Hugh had wisely chosen to sweet the audience in advance by providing a mini Chinese buffet and copious amounts of alcohol. But their master stroke was holding the presentations in Suso's spare bedroom meaning Jake was able to recline in comfort and silence till the very end.

HAMMER OF THE GODS....

 

Following on from her visit the other week to Forsyth's in Rothes, Isidora's research into the qualities of her chosen working material continued when she met with one of Glenfiddich's most respected craftsman; Dennis McBain. For fifty years Dennis served as the distilleries coppersmith and as such was responsible for the maintenance, repair and replacement of our stills.

 

it would not be an exaggeration to describe Dennis's knowledge of working copper as being encyclopaedic and to his credit it is a knowledge he is more than happy to share. Isidora was not only shown some of tools employed in the manipulation of copper sheets, through  heat and hammer, into the flowing curves of a complete still. She also gained some first hand experience of how the copper behaves when heated. This will be important when she comes to work with it herself. Indeed the parameters of the material's qualities will have an influence in shaping the form of her final work.

 

 

Despite being officially retired since 2008 Dennis is still a common face at the distillery always happy to share some fascinating insights to his craft. From the burning of juniper in a newly made still before the first distillation, to 'sweeten the copper'. To some of the terminology used in still construction. Dennis drew our attention to how different pieces of the still are named after parts of the body, the shoulder, neck, belly, throat etc. Such an empathic vernacular conveys the quality of dedication and passion that can be found in many of those involved with the production of our single malt. Dennis is no exception and over his life time he has developed a deeper understanding with the still almost becoming a living, breathing thing, being cared for and nurtured by Mr Dennis McBain, the still doctor.

SPANISH SUN ...

Its been another busy and sunny week up at Glenfiddich. Monday saw the arrival of the artist known simply as Suso 33, the first Spaniard to be in residence here since 2007. Although Suso's work also involves video and performance he our first resident to practice street/urban art.

The inspiration environment of The Glenfiddich Distillery has already provided Suso with a number of ideas, which as they come to him are jotted down in his notepad for future reference, one or two have even been put into practice. Using the gable of his residency accommodation as a canvas and water as a medium he has been producing ephemeral graffiti which begins to fade away almost as soon as it appears.

As well as comings there has also been goings, with Joyce heading back to Taiwan to attend a family wedding and Han off to a Paris studio to begin the editing work on the sound recordings he has collected over the past few weeks to provide the audio content of his installation. This meant that they both not only missed this week's ceilidh but also the first of Hugh's 'salon' evenings which, was attended by two visiting artists, Carl and Nick, who are currently in residence at the Scottish Sculpture  Workshop over the hill in Lumsden.

SPORTS AND SOCIAL...

For newest resident Hugh Hayden the first week at Glenfiddich has been something of a social whirl. Dallas born Hugh arrived in the middle of a spell of fine sunny weather allowing Rhonda's husband Richard the opportunity to let everyone play with his nice shiny new balls.

Despite no one really being too sure of the rules or indeed the proper technique for playing. Aided by several 'Ginger Jerries' it still managed to remain a good natured game, with gallery assistant Gail proving herself to be champion of the bouls.

Hugh takes up the sixth residency place this summer and for the next three months he plans a series of sculptural works contiuning his interest in camouflage, landscape and ground nesting game birds. In between asking questions Hugh also enjoys to drink lots of water and make strong coffee.

As well as showing Hugh round the distillery site - now almost back to normal after the recent 'silent season' he has also had the chance to get out and about to see the local surroundings and some of the habitats where his elusive game birds are to be found. We even found time to squeeze in the obligatory trip to Elgin to visit the holy trinity of residency retail therapy, - B&Q, Moray Office Supplies and Asda.

However highlight of the week had to be the first ceilidh of summer where this years ceilidh virgins were introduced to the Dashing White Sergeant and his friends the Gay Gordons.

PIPE DREAMS...

 

Now that we are a good month into the residency, many artistic projects are starting to come together. For Han Wonsuk this saw a special delivery of custom made cardboard tubes arriving on Tuesday. These are to be incorporated into the audio installation Han is currently preparing our black room for in his own particular style. Always dressed for the occasion, Han likes to compliment his Dutch prison overalls look with colour co-ordinated accessories.

Meanwhile in the front part of the gallery Tuesday also saw the last session of Rhonda's coin making workshop. With the coin sculptures now completed and a mold made of each one. The next step of casting a replica using a special material that shrinks down four times smaller than the original can be carried out. It is these smaller coins that will eventually be recreated in cast copper. 

SILENCE PLEASE .....

It has been a quiet week up at Glenfiddich, literally. Late spring has long been the traditional time for the so called 'Silent Season' when many distilleries across Speyside cease production for up to three weeks in order for essential maintenance and safety checks to be carried out on the plant and equipment. For most of the past couple of weeks the still houses of Glenfiddich have pretty much been out of bounds to visitors. But with the shut down now coming to an end and production scheduled to start up once again there was an opportunity to get our newest resident, Isidora Correa in for a quick tour of the process areas.

Isidora is our very first artist from Chile. So far she has used ceramics, plastics and wood in her sculptural works. However for her time at Glenfiddich she plans on using copper as her primary material. Coincidently, Chile is the worlds top producer of copper and has with in it's territory well over a quarter of the world's total reserves. 

The tour of the Glenfiddich process areas let her see first hand just how central copper is in the production of single malt whisky. Not only do it's physical properties of being highly malleable and an excellent conductor of heat make it ideal for the construction of stills and other pieces of distilling equipment. It has qualities that allow it to interact with the hot vapours rise up inside the still. 'Sweetening' the flavour profile of the new make spirit, removing some of the more sulphurous elements present in the brew. Over time the scouring action of hot gases inside the still cause certain areas of the vessel to wear out faster than others. In areas of high scouring such as the top of the still, where the vapours meet the swan neck, up to 2mm of copper thickness can be lost over the life time use - normally around 15 to 20 years.

Stills are of course themselves highly crafted objects, the matching of function and form is almost sculptural itself. As the shape and size of a still directly affects the character and flavour profile of the new make spirit it produces there has developed a huge variety of designs, unique to each distillery. The stills of Glenfiddich are particularly small so as a comparison we also managed to take a look at William Grant and Son's other two distilleries, Balvenie and Kinnive, allowing Isidora to begin to understand the range of forms and sizes stills can take.

This was further reinforced with a special visit to Forsyths of Rothes, a family owned business based a few miles from Dufftown. Forsyths are one of Scotland's principle coppersmiths serving the distilling industry internationally. Our visit by special arrangement allowed Isidora and Rhonda the opportunity to see an age old craft in action. Although modern technology is now employed at certain stages of production. The vast majority of the process involved in transforming a sheet of metal into a ready to function distilling vessel still requires a high degree of traditional handcrafting and finishing. And so with same techniques and tools being used today that would have been know to the companies founder Alexander Forsyth when he began his apprenticeship in the 1890's.

As well as checking on the progress of new stills currently being made for Glenfiddich. We were also able to see a number of other finished stills ready to be installed at distilleries both home and abroad. Being given this rare opportunity to see such a group of stills assembled together really brought home the diversity and beauty of these objects.