4th Jun 2025 to 11th Aug 2025 | |
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Dunfermline Carnegie Library and Galleries 1-7 Abbot Street , Dunfermline KY12 7 N |
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This is a free event | |
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CONTENT WARNING: Please be advised that this exhibition explores the historical events and themes surrounding Witch trials and includes visual and written content that may be unsuitable for younger visitors. Visitors aged 16 years and under must be accompanied by an adult.
The Scottish Witchcraft Act (ANENTIS WITCHCRAFTIS) came into effect on the 4th of June 1563. Under this law, the practice of witchcraft and consulting with witches became capital offences. It is estimated that in Scotland alone, around four thousand people (84% of whom were women) were persecuted, with two-thirds of these executed for the crime of witchcraft. The Act remained on Scottish statute books until it was repealed in 1735.
This innovative exhibition, with over 50 pieces, is a creative response to the deadly law penned by the hands of men that lit the spark of the burning times. The exhibition has been curated by Rowan Morrison and features a collection of multimedia art, poetry and prose from a coven of creatives whose artistry is interwoven with remembrance of the Scottish witch hunts.
The visual and literary art interpretations of witch persecution are offered without an accompanying history written from the viewpoint of the patriarchal elite. This method unweaves the blinkered bias that dehumanises the accused witches and enables you to bear witness to unveiled visions and intimate voices that are channelled from the otherworld.
This emotive exhibition will take you back to a time when the skies above Scotland were lit with flames, fuelled by the flesh of burning women.
About the Curator
Rowan Morrison www.rowanmorrison.co.uk is a storyteller, visual artist, and author of The Witches of Culross. Her unbound creative practice weaves threads of folklore in all her work. This wisewoman views the witch hunts through a spiritual lens and believes that the wounds of persecution have been carried through time. She has given voice to the accused witches of Scotland through her oral and written stories, songs, performance art, and memorial events.
About the Creative Coven Exhibition
For this exhibition, Rowan has brought together a coven of creatives whose work is inspired by the Scottish witch hunts:
Crabbit Carlin
Eve Davison
Helen Wright
Jane Mather
Katy Bremer
Karen Strang
Linda Morrow
Marianne Berghuis
Together, they weave a creative remembrance of the daughters and sons of Scotland who were persecuted during the burning times. Their vision is to give voice to the thousands who suffered historic persecution, torture and execution during the Scottish witch hunts. Their mission is to explore this dark period in Scottish history through the emotive power of the creative arts.
The accompanying eclectic artwork includes a seven-foot wicker devil who awaits your shameful kiss, multi-media pieces such as the emotive Maiden, Mother and Crone sculptures, the large-scale Burning Witch, a miniature coven of 13 Witch Children, and transformational art pieces in glass bottles. The Witch’s Blood will take you on a dark journey through the smouldering abyss of the burning times, to view the channelled portraits of accused witches and Lilias Aide’s death mask.
Pieces inspired by the Unknown Witch project and the Linen Memorial of Witch Persecution in Scotland will be on show. These hallowed panels, which contain almost four thousand names, lay bare the scale of injustice endured by the daughters and sons of Scotland after the Witchcraft Act of 1563.
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