Photography by Kirstin McEwan and courtesy of the Artists and Remembering Together D&G
New musical compositions, theatre productions, walking trails and art exhibitions, and a Dispersed Forest are among the ways our communities, working with specially commissioned artists, have come up with to honour people lost during the pandemic and preserve the best of what we learned and created together during that time. Carol Hogarth reports
‘Collective acts of reflection, remembrance, hope and healing” have been springing up in communities across Scotland as part of the national Covid memorial project, Remembering Together.
Everything from new musical compositions and theatre productions to walking trails and art exhibitions have been co-curated by artists and communities.
Dumfries & Galloway’s Covid memorial has taken the form of a Dispersed Forest – more than 400 native trees planted across five sites, each with unique markers reflecting the wishes and experiences of its individual community.
Planting events and gatherings have taken place throughout this year and residents are now being encouraged to visit, discover and take ownership of their memorials.
“There’s a mixture of relief and fear in handing over these memorials to the people who will now live with them every day,” says artist Katie Anderson, who has worked on Dumfries & Galloway’s Remembering Together project with fellow artist and researcher Dr t s Beall.
Ts says: “We would encourage people to visit the memorials, explore them and hopefully find solace in them. We hope they will grow to be something people consider to be theirs.”
The Dumfries & Galloway project also included community gatherings at each of the sites and an archive, both digital and physical, recording experiences of the pandemic.
In 2022 Remembering Together commissioned artists in all 32 Scottish regions to “find ways of honouring the people lost during the pandemic, mark what changed in our lives, and preserve the best of what we learned and created together” during that time.
Overseen nationally by Greenspace Scotland, with Scottish Government funding, the Remembering Together Dumfries & Galloway delivery partners were DG Unlimited and Dumfries and Galloway Council.
“Ts and I had both worked on Atlas Pandemica, a Stove Network commission, in 2020 based on the impact of the pandemic on communities,” says Katie. “That made an interesting starting point.”
Ts had also been working on a pandemic-focussed project in Glasgow with care workers. “From my experience talking to frontline workers I saw the need for a memorial project like this,” she says.
Katie adds: “Both of us felt this commission was too big for one person to hold by themselves” and ts says: “We felt our skills were distinct but compatible.”
The pair heard in June 2022 they had successfully won the commission.
For the next four or five months, Katie and ts launched themselves into conversations with more than 800 people - individuals and community groups.
“It was a very broad brief,” says ts. “The end result could have been a book, an opera, an online project…we had to come up with a proposal that would be most appropriate for the region.”
The pair visited community events, engaging people with creative activities including postcard making and writing messages on ribbons to tie to a sculptural clootie tree. They also scheduled bespoke workshops for specific groups including NHS staff, young people and unpaid carers.
“We engaged with people who’d had very different experiences,” Katie explains.
“We asked people to reflect on those experiences, what they wanted to remember about the pandemic and what they wanted to let go of.
“Some people said that was the first chance they’d had to talk about their pandemic experiences outside their families.
“We always felt the weight of the brief,” ts adds. “That has never left us. These stories of loss and resilience that have collectively been the stories of people across the region.”
Repeating themes began to emerge including that a memorial should be in many places not just Dumfries; there should be a relationship with nature, with the outdoors; and the impact of certain outdoor community spaces.
“Lots of people talked about how the pandemic had led to them getting out into nature,” says ts, “how valuable it had been to reconnect with nature, how being forced to stay in their own area made them appreciate it, how precious that daily walk became.
“Spaces like Threave and the Crichton kept coming up, so these were the sites we began to focus on.”
As the Dispersed Forest idea developed, it was decided to plant a tree for each one of the 375 people in the region who died of Covid during the pandemic (according to National Records) plus extra for other kinds of losses.
“We know that number is contested, and we’re still losing people to Covid,” says ts, “but the idea of the forest is that it will continue to expand, the trees will seed and grow.”
The Dispersed Forest proposal was submitted in January 2023.
Most of the rest of 2023 was spent securing sites in Dumfries, Moffat, Sanquhar, Castle Douglas and Stranraer and gaining permissions for tree planting.
In Dumfries, two connected sites were chosen on the Crichton estate and at Mountainhall Treatment Centre.
Woodland management company Treesurv became a project partner to survey the sites and identify suitable native species for each one.
Public planting events were planned for each site between February and April 2024.
“There is something very special about planting a tree,” says Katie. “We really wanted people to learn about, and experience that.”
Ts says: “The plan was always to collaborate with communities, to encourage people to become engaged and see the memorial as their own.”
Markers were then designed to let visitors know each plantation is part of a Covid memorial. While the materials are similar – sandstone and granite, wood and bronze – and each one includes two handwritten messages from the original postcards and ribbons carved into the stone, the designs are site specific.
From the original conversation phase, community gatherings were a common theme, so these were organised for each site over this summer as a way of handing over the memorials to the communities.
They all involved music, food, conversation and creative activities.
“We wanted to introduce the memorials to their communities,” says Katie. “At some point you have to hand over to the people who will live with it every day. The Gathering events were part of that.”
Sharing stories was another key idea which came out of the project’s initial conversations, so the artists have recorded and archived different experiences of people across the region.
Excerpts from these interviews are now being shared on the project’s website along with information about the Dispersed Forest sites and images taken throughout the project.
Material will also go into a physical archive held by Dumfries & Galloway Heritage Services.
www.memorialforestdg.co.uk
THE MEMORIAL SITES
The Moffat Community Nature Reserve (What Three Words: president.spouse.holly)
125 trees: Sessile oak, downy birch, aspen, juniper, hazel, hawthorn, crab apple, rowan, bird cherry, alder, holly, guelder rose, elder.
Marker: Paving stones inlaid with bronze panels.
Six locations across the Crichton Estate and NHS Mountainhall creating a walking loop. Crichton Memorial Church, Easterbrook Hall, Dudgeon House, Monreith House, plus Occupational Health and Three Road Ends, both at Mountainhall Treatment Centre.
(What Three Words: sparkles.parading.trusts)
More than 125 trees: Silver birch, wild cherry, rowan, field maple, juniper, crab apple, lime, wild pear, hawthorn, hazel, pendunculate oak, holly, guelder rose, wych elm.
Each location has a sandstone marker with bronze inset plaque.
Bells Crescent Park, Sanquhar. (What Three Words: topics.offers.freedom)
Small cluster of trees: Rowan, crab apple, wild cherry, field maple, silver birch
Marker: Oak bench with ground-set, sandstone paving and bronze inset.
NTS Threave Nature Reserve. (What Three Words allies.taken.premature)
50 trees: Pendunculate oak, downy birch, wild cherry, hazel, hawthorn, crab apple, rowan, holly, guelder rose.
Marker: Dalbeattie granite and oak bench with bronze inset.
Grounds of Galloway Community Hospital (What Three Words: bearable.scars.blazed)
Small cluster of trees: Crab apple, wild cherry, field maple, silver birch
Marker: Inscribed upright sandstone and bronze.
Remembering Together D&G was commissioned by greenspace Scotland, DG Unlimited, and Dumfries & Galloway Council with funding from the Scottish Government.
