Oil painting entitle 'A Coronach in the Backwoods'

The pioneer settler plays a lament on the bagpipe and his wife weeps and comforts the baby after receiving news from Scotland.

The artist invites us to recall the resourcefulness and independence of the Highland emigrant who has single-handedly cleared the forest with his axe and built a cabin but whose mind is still filled with the vision of home. For the Gaelic Scot, the image represents the homesickness and sense of longing summed up in the words cianalas which pervades 19th and 20th century literature and oral tradition, and the dark forbidding trees and hostile environment echo the lines of the Tiree bard, John MacLean (1787 - 1848) in Canada where he signs of the Gloomy Forest' (A' Choille Ghruamach): ... Coming across the ocean on the journey that was deceiving. To the land of the trees where there is no freedom. ... [Tighinn thar a' chuain air a' chuairt a tha meallt' Gu tir nan craobh anns nach eil an t-saorsainn].

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