Orla Barry clearly has a true vocation for her flock, both handling real livestock and weaving them into her art and this documentary has poetic beauty
Near the beginning of this beautiful, brooding film, Orla Barry (its subject/writer/narrator) remembers a farming expert advising her to go into cattle or vegetables after she inherited her family spread in Ireland. But really he could tell, she says, that she was “Orla with the ovine eyes” – meaning that her undeniable destiny was with the even-toed ungulates. Director Cara Holmes lets Barry’s flitting, digressive monologue shape the film, uttered in the slow, deep voice of a countrywoman just as used to declaiming from the stage in performance art pieces.
Because, it turns out, Barry is also an artist who works in a range of media, using text and typography as well as film, fleece and whatever takes her fancy. Having moved from Belgium and started raising sheep with her then partner Elsa and two sons more than 10 years ago, it’s now impossible to say whether she’s an artist who farms or a farmer who makes art. Her mixed flock of walnut-coloured Zwartbles and snowy, dainty-featured Lleyn inspire and contribute literally to her artworks – which at one point included a massive mound of unsold fleece.
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Source link : https://www.theguardian.com/film/2024/sep/17/notes-from-sheepland-review-lovely-portrait-of-artist-farmer-who-only-has-eyes-for-sheep
Author : Leslie Felperin
Publish date : 2024-09-17 08:00:37
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