VACMA Spotlight: Sharon McGeady "Peat: A Fuel for Living"

Sharon McGeady was successful in her application for the Winter 2024/25 round of Visual Artists and Craft Makers Awards (VACMA). In this blog, titled "Peat: A Fuel for Living", she shares with us her how the funding has allowed her to research and develop a new body of work examining the natural environment and resources of North Mainland (Shetland).

Sharon is a ceramist, who you may know from The Pottery, North Roe.

"What is good and what is bad? I do not have the answers, but in my mind there needed to be a wider conversation and for me clay was the way to initiate this."

"In 2025 I was fortunate enough to be offered a VACMA (Visual Artist and Craft Makers Award) to explore the importance of our peatlands here in Shetland and to capture a point in time where we are on the cusp of huge change. I would like to thank Shetland Arts, Creative Scotland and VACMA for their support in enabling me to dedicate time to creating something which I believe raises questions on a hugely important issue.

I live in a wild, beautiful place where old and new worlds collide. The life of the traditional crofter has, for centuries, aligned with the seasons and the weather. Lambing, casting peats, sowing oats, clipping sheep, fishing and hay making have sustained individuals and communities throughout the isles. The arrival of oil set Shetland apart and brought prosperity for some, as well as other huge environmental impacts. Recently the Scottish government’s decision to build 103 huge wind turbines on environmentally sensitive peatland areas has split communities with some seeing this as progress and others as tragedy. 

Those few folk who still cut their peat banks by hand for fuel with the sweat of their labour, one peat at a time, stand and watch wide eyed as huge machines pour thousands of tonnes of concrete into virgin peat to make ‘green’ energy. Boats from far off lands arrive with blades, diggers and lorries disrupt travel and divide communities, substations and cables take this resource hundreds of miles away to the south to benefit those who we do not know and who possibly do not care about our environment. Wildlife is left to survive the best it can. Words such as ‘carbon neutral’, ‘sustainable’ and ‘renewables’ become common language in the media and are banded about with assumptions and without explanations.

What is good and what is bad? I do not have the answers, but in my mind there needed to be a wider conversation and for me clay was the way to initiate this.

For generations the peat fired stove was as the heart of the home. It heated the living space, boiled water, brewed tea, cooked bannocks and soup, dried mutton and fish, warmed sick lambs and was the centre of life. Here, at the hearth, fiddle music played, stories were shared, ganseys knitted, kishies woven and babies welcomed. The resting chair by the fire was where old folk snoozed at the close of their days. Peat was the fuel for the living. When the fire went out, life was extinguished and stone homes became damp and slowly turned to rubble."

"I began to prepare for the work I intended to make and became deeply immersed in my time in the peat hill. I listened attentively to the bird calls and rejoiced when the tirricks returned to their nesting sites on the shore. In my mind I pictured the never-ending movement of deep water round the isles and heard the thunderous music in the roar of the waves whilst breathing to the meditative rhythm of my tushkar slicing through the peat. The whisper of the wind in the heather rose and fell, a distant cry of sheep looking for their companions carried across the hillside.

I recorded through photographs and sketches the shadows on the hillside, how the isle of Yell slowly disappeared into the fog or how the light glistened on the distant horizon and became fascinated by the patterns made when building the peat wall so that it didn’t tumble. I compared colours, took in smells, made rubbings of the vegetation to note the different textures within the layers. Wild space, clear air, hard rock, soft, springy moorland, crumbling edges, gurgling water brought joy. Casting my mind inwards I listened humbly to the voices of the ancient peoples who worked so hard to keep their families and animals alive during famine or unbelievable cold, rain or snow, their struggles and triumphs written into the calloused hands.

Softening my hard edges and becoming pliable and malleable to new perceptions enabled me to respond to the fragile landscape so my awareness became sharper, clearer and cleaner. Peat does not just sustain people, it is a whole ecology. Wild things nestle, nest, and creep. Sheep shape this land as they graze the poor vegetation. Lambs, mothers, grandmothers and great grandmothers following nose to tail along ancient routes, their paths meandering through the hill.

I have made several vessels to date and there will be more. They portray the precarious nature of peat, the cracks of erosion by rain and wind, the thinness of the top vegetation, its deep colour and the texture of its form. The pots are ceremonial and tactile. Each vessel is creatively braver than the one before and each one has more depth of understanding about the richness of this wonderful resource we have been given.

I am a hand builder. The clay is stretched, beaten, torn and layered, then dusted with dried red clay, sand, vegetation and peat mould. In our peat bank there is a seam of sand which was reputed to be from the 1500s when a tsunami hit our shores so I have used locally collected wild clay to represent this. Thin vegetable matter is considerable in the top layer of our bank so I have incorporated our own hay, dead heather, found animal bones and used bird egg shells into the clay. Throughout the hill layers of volcanic debris lie, so pumice, granite, feldspars and mica have been included in the lower parts of the vessels. These first vessels were made using a former so, although each piece is different, there is a rhythm and uniformity of process mimicking the formation of our lands.

Coloured slips and inclusions add drama. Peat is usually wet and reflects the light so peat ash is used within the vessels to make a simple glaze, and within the finished bowls I have placed sphagnum moss, dried grasses, found animal bones and volcanic pebbles to show the richness of life in the peatlands. In my vessels I used Scarva grogged black and red clays for the main body of the work which gives a rich dark colour."

I am in the process of finding opportunities to show the vessels which will be accompanied by writings, photos and observations from the hill but, until then, the vessels are resting near the peat shed door. Visitors to the pottery are drawn to them and thus the conversation begins, just as I hoped it would. How can we use natures recourses respectfully and sustainably? What does ‘green’ actually mean, and what is our own responsibility in the debate?

What have I learnt? As part of my process I discovered new ways with my hands but these pieces also required my heart. Creating meaningful work is not hollow or superficial, it requires the maker and artist to take a deep dive into a world where we are open, receptive and appreciative to sound, smell, feeling, touch and taste. In this instance I connected with tradition, heritage, environment, even how the land was formed. The vessels record a moment in time, but this process will go on and on because the practise of listening and close observation has changed my work irrevocably.

I urge us all to continue to challenge and stretch ourselves, reach for new horizons, and take opportunities when they arise. Let us become sensitive and yielding to new ideas and concepts in how we see the world, live adventurously, and in the moment.

I was fortunate to have articles about the VACMA project published in the Scottish Potters Association magazine and also the Anglian Potters magazine."

- Sharon McGeady, North Roe, Shetland (The Pottery, North Roe)