Robert Burns comes to mind as January moves forward and its not a great leap of faith to explore for a moment if we could have found common ground in an imagined conversation about Art, specifically Collaborative Art. He himself had a long productive collaborative history with James Johnson, so as starting points go the quote in the title leapt out.

The Kirins’ latest collaborations are led by Lorna’s linear printed creative input with Stephen contributing Watercolour. This is a departure from previous work when Stephen was specifically providing the linear in conversation with Lorna’s colour. Just briefly by way of context as a young man Stephen was a painter. He can hear his brash younger self exclaiming against the linear in deference to pure form through paint!

We often travel through the years with a growing awareness of certainty being uncertain and this is a case in point. With this knowledge the irony of Stephen being immersed in lines in later years is not lost on them.

Perhaps it was time for Stephen to paint again , perhaps its a voice that needed to come out at the same speed as Lorna’s lines which she is so keen to engage with.

As Burns said ” we could see the uncertainty in a sure thing” or the uncertainty in a sure style?

And for now we are liberated by the paradox of embracing unknowns that we may know nevertheless. We feel Robert Burns could talk with us about our collaborative art and we could have a good exchange of ideas about taking a chance with style. At time of writing it’s his time of year, so let’s have a dram with him and doff our caps to a bit of wisdom.