GalGael at Portsoy Traditional Boat Festival

Blessed with some blue sky, a work team of twenty occupied GalGael's now customary site in the Old Harbour at the Portsoy Traditional Boat Festival. Over the course of the weekend, the festival was reported to have 16,000 visitors and a fair whack of them will have come through our marquee, taking in carving, spinning and oar making. Our workshop back in Govan looked like we'd moved out as GalGael went on tour and set out their barra on the Moray Coast. It's always heart warming to interact with the general public and we got some tremendous feedback.

Mark on oar making

Rosie & Dougie rustle up custom on the raffle

Our boat (red, centre) nestles in with the rest of the skiffs

ps. if you entered the raffle, it was drawn on the stage in the harbour at 4 p.m. Sunday. 1st prize Flory, Portsoy; 2nd prize Romanik, Portsoy, 3rd prize Morag, Portsoy Thanks to all who entered!

Community against Coastal Erosion

Seumas and Tam reperesented GalGael along with staff and volunteers from Sunny Govan Radio, Tea in the Pot, Govanhill Baths and Karibou on a trip to South Uist to share experiences with locals and to see where we can help each other set up some new community initiatives. The trip was organised with Oxfam as part of their domestic strategy to deal with issues around poverty in the UK.

The group visited a fish farm, a hatchery, a seaweed processing facility and helped put up some fences as part of a coastal barrier to prevent the sea encroaching on precious farmland and machair. You can see pics at the link below.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/65054665@N05/

We're All Winners

A bunch of us piled in to a minibus and hit the M8 through to Edinburgh on Thursday night. We were short-listed for the Community Action category of the Scottish Charity Awards &..... we won! I like to think that it's an award for every nail that was hammered in off kilter, every saw cut that was off the mark and all those people who overcame these set backs to produce something beautiful and useful. And for all our beautiful and useful staff, board members, volunteers and participants! g x
READ MORE ABOUT THE AWARDS HERE...
and HERE

Some pics from April 2011

new Govan

We were down at the Govan Cross Opening Ceremony on 1 June and the unveiling of the newly restored Aitken Memorial Fountain. It's all looking smart as paint. But I have to share this picture - one to strike fear in to the heart of any official! g

St Ayles Skiff

The St Ayles Skiff built by pupils from Smithycroft and St Mungo's high schools hit the water at Anstruther this weekend for her sea trial. The last coats of paint and varnish were put on last week before the GalGael team towed her up to the East Neuk of FiFe. The building of the boat has been taking place in the GalGael workshop over the last year as part of the Sense over Sectarianism project. Another skiff is well underway and is being collaboratively built by Lourdes Secondary and Govan High School. Find out more about the event at;

http://scottishcoastalrowing.org/2011/05/30/skiff-19-galgael-join-the-fleet/

GalGael in the Gallery

Some of our staff and volunteers have been assisting in setting up a large sculptural work in Kelvingrove Gallery and Museum with artist Trish Cain.

A letter of thanks from Trish is shown below.

See the link within the text for youtube video:

Hi Martin

Anne and I just wanted to say a really huge thank you to everyone for the help you gave us to construct the installation for the Kelvingrove Exhibition.

Without the considerable skill and expertise of everyone at GalGael, it just wouldn’t have been possible at all and a huge part of the exhibition would have been left unfulfilled, so thank you for taking that phone call and then getting roped into it all!

We’ve had fantastic feedback about the structure and a lot of interest in the process of construction. As you know, a film was made about how the exhibition came together by Isla Pedrana and Solveig Seuss. Here’s the link to the uploaded video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sq8JQg1l_kM

I’d like to say thank you to you, Norrie, Ben, Dave, Omair, Kevin, Stuart, Michael, Robert, Cameron and anyone else I’ve missed and also to say a special thank you to John Campbell for coming up so often to the gallery to help us.

Please keep me in mind for any assistance I might give you in return, particularly in relation to drawing projects, as I owe you.

All the best and see you soon no doubt.

Trish Cain