& Paradise regained
Ian Hamilton Finlay, the celebrated renegade artist who died recently, created a unique garden, Little Sparta. One writer and filmmaker describes how it felt to shoot a film about the artist amidst this strangely moving Borders landscape.
n 2004 a panel (ll. 50 altists and gallery tlit‘ccttn's y'otcd
Ian llamilton l'inlay‘s garden 'thc nation’s greatest
artwork'. In the lorty years since it was begun. Little Spatta's artistic signilicancc has grown to such an extent that curators and artists haye tl‘ayelled the globe to see it. My lirst trip was in IUSS. by which stage l'inlay and his collaborators had already laid out much ol their stall.
By that stage in my lilc I‘d seen (itir't‘tllt‘tl and (iiotto's Scroyegni ('hapcl. but no work ol art had giycn me goosebumps as Little Sparta did. I tried to capttrre its numinous leeling with my Smm camera. but my llickering lootage tnade the place look dappled and pretty. like Monet's (iiy‘erny. It couldn‘t capture the shock I lelt when I saw the Temple ol Aeneas and l)ido with its lightning strike. symbolising the storm lrom which the couple sheltered as well as the terror ol the SS. It made l'iinlay's w'ot'k Nuclear Still look like a Barbara llcpw'orth sctrlpturc without catching its other relercnccs the conning tower ol a nuclear submarine. the altarpiece ol' it Scottish church.
Beyond the shock ol' these things was the longing in the garden. liy'cry where I turned there was a lament lor what liinlay' seemed to think ill as less debasetl times the French Rcyolution. the classical past. etc. At the Very edge ol the garden was a classical column carycd with the words “The World has been limpty since the Romans‘.
I did not know whether I agreed with this obseryation. btit the leeling ol griel a itsell hall lost in the wind ol the moor was palpable. I think I cried. This simple Scottish crolt was ltrll ol leeling. The big tree at the bottom ol the i—‘arden carried the Plaque Marc .\'ostrtim. ‘()ur Sea' (what the Romans called the Mediterraneani. because the sound ol the wind in it reminded Finlay ol the sea. where he spent his youth. Here was eyocation again. Pl'tWtK‘illlUll and loss. I started to go more regularly to Little Sparta. and each time I lelt it. I lelt tl sense Ul. loss.
The years later. I cominced the BBC to let me make a short dtx‘umentary lilm about it. Despite the lact that the last kilometre to Little Sparta is a dirt track. we brought a crane up to it and a steadicam. l was determined to capture its ghosts the Voices ol Rousseau or Saint—.ltIste ~ by haying our shots tloat into the garden and through it.
The result was a decent enough stab at eyoking a place which itsell is all about eyocation. (her the years. things changed in Little Sparta. 'The World has been limpty since the Romans’ disappeared. or was moy'ed. The Marc .\'ostttim tree broke and became a stubby Version ol itsell. I became director olthe lidinburgh l-‘ilm l5cstiyal and took people like l)a\ id (‘ronenberg there. He loy'ed it.
Ian Hamilton l5inlay' died in March. aged 80. I went back to Little Sparta last week to record an intrtxluetion to the film I made all those years ago. when l was in my 20s. The garden was chilly and bleak. It had not quite
10 THE LIST 25 May—8 Juli .3006
LITTLE SPARTA IS A PLACE YOU GO TO THINK OF OTHER PLACES
recoycrcd lrom the long w inter. btrt it was still doing w hat it always did. sendng yott spiralling in on yoursell. eonlronting yotr with lormcr times and places and with the lact that nature is indillcrent to you. I remembered the young lilmmaker l was when I first went there. I cried again. I thought these tears were lor my younger sell. but then realised they w ercn‘t. Little Sparta had a new distance. As well as cyoking l‘rance and Rome. it now.
also. had started to ey‘oke something else: lan himsell. What should be done with Little Sparta now that. as l’inlays son Alec l‘inlay said last week. ‘thc king is dead and the garden has become a tlc'tirtrc'r‘11c'y"'.’ That‘s lor the Little Sparta Trust to decide. Their plans lor a Virtual garden online. to make it accessible but protect the garden itsell. are most welcome. Alter all. as l"inlay‘s lriend Alison (‘ampbell suggested recently. in a way Little Sparta was ney'er really there in the lirst
places.
But what about l’inlay‘s yoice'.’ Surely his splendid. ideasy letters should be published. Like many people. I have quite a lew: sortie describe unrealised projects. Years ago I tried to get lunding lor a simple lrlm. 'I'lit' 'li'mplr' Letters; in which l‘inlay‘s epi. tles about the dispute he had with Strathcly‘dc Region over whether tax should be paid on his temple dedicated To Apollo. llis Music. llis Missiles and His Mtises. would be read on the soundtrack. The imager would be simply lramed shots ol the temple and garden itsell.
l5inlay insisted that his temple was a religious building. not an art gallery. so exempt lrom taxation. llis letters conjure the parallel intellectual world he inhabited which. as olten as not. cony'inced me that it was closer to the truth than my own. The debate was gripping. Surely. now is the time to make lltt‘ li'ttrplr' lx'ttt'rx. to get the crane and the steadicam back up to Little Sparta again.
Ian Hamilton Finlay: In a Wee Way is on BBC2 Scotland, Sat 27 May.
place. It was a place you go to think olother
PlUCKING FRUITS FROM THE CULTURAL BUSH
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