The Scots are Coming

About This Group

All things Scottish, Scottish born, Scottish people, Scottish places, Scottish words and Scottish thoughts..anything or anyone with a Scottish connection and is open to Scots and non Scots alike..

Simple Guidelines:

1. The group is to be used purely as a portal for thoughts, reminiscences, images and words about Scotland, its people, its culture, its landscape and its wildlife, in a positive and interesting way to allow anyone that is interested to see the beauty of the place and its people.

1. The group will share ideas, suggestions and advice on the images and words in a positive and helpful way, for the benefit of each other.

“THE SCOTS ARE COMING” INTERVIEW

Our third interviewee is our last challenge winner David Sargent

1. Firstly, tell us more about your winning image and why it was this one that inspired you to enter it for the challenge?
The photo was taken at the top Gondola station on the Nevis range as the sun went down on an early June evening. You won’t normally find me at the top of Scottish mountains no matter the time of year! My old knees wouldn’t normally stand the climb. I was up there to accompany my wife who had gone to register for the ‘10 Under the Ben’ mountain bike event taking place the next day and had taken advantage of the ‘free’ gondola ride to the top offered by the organisers. As she stood in a very long queue to register, I bought myself a beer and sat down outside to enjoy the sunset. I snapped off twenty or thirty shots of the landscape, the chairlifts, and the gondolas climbing the hillside. When I got them on my computer the next day most looked pretty ordinary – I don’t have the patience or the artistic eye for landscapes. I prefer my subjects to move – sports and wildlife ideally. However, on a second look at the ‘Sunset on Loch Eil’ shot I was drawn to the softness of the light and how it reminded me of the types of shot I used to love to try to capture when we lived on the Island of Bute some 20 years ago. You cannot beat Scotland’s west coast for spectacular sunsets.

2. Everyone can see your RB profile, but tell us a bit more about DSargent and his art?
I get a bit anxious when people refer to my work as ‘art’. I’m a scientist to training and occupation and have always tried to make my photos ‘tell it as it is’. I think that is why I’m happier snapping events that move at some pace. I have always been envious of folk who can see the line and form in a scene and can compose a great looking image from a landscape or and abstract scene. It’s something I don’t think I possess and so hesitate to label my work ‘art’.

3. How did you start your artistic journey and what inspires to continue?
I have carried a camera for as long as I can remember. Starting with an old Kodak 120 roll film camera and progressing through various innovations in 126, 110 and eventually graduating to 35mm. My first 35mm cameras were old Russian Zenit B’s. They were extremely cheap and the bodies could be replaced for about £18 in the early 1970’s. Being manual cameras they forced me into learning the basic principals – something I think that has stood me in good stead ever since. I flirted with developing and printing my own black and white prints for a while too. When I left school and started working I saved some money and bought a Pentax M series 35mm camera which went everywhere with me until I discovered digital only fairly recently. Sports and wildlife photography has been my special interests for a long time and I like nothing better on a Saturday afternoon than being trackside at a sports event, preferably involving my beloved Ayr United!

4. What do you think is your greatest accomplishment as an artist to date?
I have always enjoyed photographing sports, especially football. In the last four or five years I have been the (unpaid) club photographer for Ayr United in the Scottish Football League. This has led to many of my images reaching publications as diverse as football books, match-day programmes, local and national press, publicity shots and even a range of calendars. Seeing my first image in newsprint at the age of ‘forty something’ was a great thrill and I’m still like a big kid rushing to buy the paper if I think one of my images is going to be used.

5. Tell us a bit more about the aspirations and goals for you in the future as an artist?
I would love to cover a ‘national’ sports event. Pure and simple. I have taken photographs trackside at Hampden Park, the Scottish national stadium, but only covering a Scottish Division 2 football match between Queens Park and Ayr United. I would love to be there, or the likes of Murrayfield, to shoot during an international match.

6. As this is group has a wee bit of the Scots about it, what single-most thing do you think of when asked about “Scotland”?
I was born and brought up in Ayr on the west coast of Scotland and having lived now in the Scottish Borders for some 20 years I still miss the sea. There is nothing that says ‘Scotland’ to me more than the sea views of Scotland’s west coast.

7. If there was only one choice of location in Scotland where you could go and visit to capture images or paint a scene, where would this be and why?
See my answer to question 5 above. It would have to be Hampden Park, Glasgow, during a Scotland international match – preferably against England! I could never tire of capturing the scenes and the passion of such an occasion.

8. Lastly, as this is your time in the “The Scots Are Coming” spotlight, is there any messages (inspirational, gratitude or otherwise) that you would like to share with the group?
I would just like to thank all members of the group and the Red Bubble community for the appreciation they have shown my work. The thrill I still get just to see a single new comment on one of my photos makes my day. Thank you.

Thanks to David for taking part and agreeing to do the interview. There will a forum thread for this interview so when it is up and running, please leave a comment for David to say how much you liked about what he had to say.

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