Community creativity takes centre stage
More than 100 people came through the doors of Inver Village Hall over the weekend of 12 and 13 September as the village celebrated the extraordinary range of creativity within its own community.
The InverCreative exhibition was held as part of the St Duthac Book & Arts Festival Art Trail and brought together work by twelve local exhibitors — from established artists and experienced makers to people showing their work publicly for the first time.
Among those taking part were 2026 Highland Art Prize nominee Doug Stuart, Inver musician Ruairidh MacKay, and artist and children’s book illustrator Emma Helyer, who shared their work alongside other local creatives.
Painting, photography, sculpture, film, fibre art and textiles, art installations and heritage storytelling all featured, creating an exhibition that was deliberately broad in both its interpretation of art and the people invited to take part.
Dance artist and choreographer Julia McGhee, who headed up the exhibition, said:
“For me, an artist is anybody who seeks to express themselves through a creative process. Selling the work you make does not determine the value of that work, or your right to call yourself an artist. I’m hoping to get people thinking and talking about what art is, who is an artist, the value of art and why it is important.”
That inclusive spirit was reflected throughout the weekend, with children, parents, grandparents, neighbours and visitors spending time not simply looking at the work, but talking about it, asking questions and joining in.
One of the exhibition’s most engaging pieces for younger visitors was an art installation created by Rosie MacKenzie exploring plastic pollution and its impact on the marine environment. The work featured a “mermaid” called Eleanor as its central character.
Beautiful at first glance, Eleanor carries a darker story. Entangled in plastic, she escapes only by losing her tail. Natural materials, shells and objects gathered from local beaches sit alongside discarded plastics and other human-made debris, showing what Rosie describes as plastic “infiltrating the beauty” of the natural world.
The installation became the starting point for conversations with children about the sea, marine life and the rubbish washing onto our shores. Activities around Eleanor encouraged them to explore shells, mermaid purses, beach finds and discarded materials, using storytelling and creativity to approach what can otherwise be an overwhelming subject.
Rosie said her aim was not simply to give children frightening information about environmental damage.
“I don’t want to just tell them the bad news,” she explained. “But by telling a story through art we can open a conversation about the beauty of the sea, and what we can do about plastic pollution and how it harms all the creatures that live in the ocean.”
The beach finds also prompted conversations across generations. Some long-standing Inver residents were surprised by the sheer variety of materials being found locally, turning the installation into not only a children’s activity but a wider discussion about changes taking place along the coastline.
Children were also able to interact with Goldy, Julia McGhee’s latest choreographic research project which has been developed over recent months with support from National Lotteries and Creative Scotland.
Visitors were able to stand underneath the Goldy and explore it at close quarters, while small gold space blankets allowed the children to play with some of the same ideas of movement, light, sound and material. For some, it was a continuation of an artistic conversation that had begun during Julia’s earlier workshops; for others, it was a first encounter with this kind of contemporary art.
Inver resident Kate Robertson said: “It was wonderful to see such an interesting and diverse range of exhibits, and some very talented folk in Inver, and also that people of all ages came out to see and support the exhibition.”
Throughout the weekend, people stopped to talk to exhibitors, recognised neighbours and familiar places within the work, brought children and grandchildren along, and discovered creative work being made quietly within their own community.
That exchange — between generations, between different kinds of art, and between artists and audiences — became one of the pleasures of the exhibition itself.
For InverCreative, that was very much the point: not simply to stage an exhibition, but to create a place where people could encounter one another through art — whether that meant looking at a painting, recognising a local story, crawling beneath a gold installation or discovering what had washed ashore on a familiar beach.
The success of the weekend — with more than 100 visitors and twelve exhibitors taking part — demonstrated just how much creativity exists within a small community when people are given an opportunity to share it.
Creative Scotland is the public body that supports culture and creativity across all parts of Scotland, distributing funding provided by the Scottish Government and The National Lottery. Further information at creativescotland.com. Follow Creative Scotland on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram.