HOSPITALFIELD HOUSE RESIDENCY

During the Hospitalfield residency in Arbroath, Scotland, my Mapping the Liminal project continued its evolution on cemeteries as evolving cultural landscapes as sites where memory, architecture, ecology, and community life intersect and shift over time.

My study in residency centered primarily on the Elizabeth Fraser Mortuary Chapel in Arbroath’s Western Cemetery. This site offered a concentrated lens through which to examine how coastal conditions, local history, and architectural form shape community memory and the experience of mourning in place. The chapel’s architectural expression of mourning, material presence, position within the landscape, and relationship to the surrounding burial ground became key anchors for the research.

Inspired by both the surrounding landscape and the dedicated studio space at Hospitalfield, the residency also generated a new body of my drawings and paintings. These works served as a way to think through spatial relationships, textures, and atmospheres, using illustration as a form of inquiry rather than final output. Together, the fieldwork and visual studies advanced the broader project on cemeteries as living cultural landscapes and contributed foundational material for the forthcoming Mapping the Liminal book.