The History of lighthouses found where treacherous coastlines present danger to  those travelling by sea, goes back far in time to the first fires lit on beaches to guide the fishermen and voyager back safely to shore through the darkness of the night.

 

As coastline sites, where hidden rocks, rips, and sandbars abound, light houses also often mark the first and last point of land for the arrival and departure of the traveller. Although acknowledged as warnings of potential danger to the seafarer, lighthouses also represent sites of mourning, where passengers died when their ships were crushed or sank. Not only seafarers were at risk. Those who undertook the building and manning of the lighthouses suffered hardships and death as a direct result of the harsh weather and challenging locations.

 

Coastlines- in their positioning between the security of land and the danger of the sea- represent a more complex phenomena. The dramatic stories that came to light in researching the establishment of light houses on our shorelines exposed acts, not only of great courage, but also human failing. These places and their histories became metaphors for other kinds of arrivals, departures and survival-on those other, less physical levels-where perceived security of the “solid ground” of our conscious activity, is never far from the subconscious as represented by a restless and treacherous sea.

 

In making Sites of warming , sites of mourning, my work in photography and film making-where dissolves, fadeouts and the editing of multiple frames create the visual experience-has influenced this series of paintings on canvas-continuing the theme of journey through light and darkness.

 

Meanwhile, creatures in harmony with their primal instincts, emerge as watchers and guardians inhabiting the edge of the land, sensing what has been….or waiting for what is yet to happen.

 

Jill Carter-Hansen's CV