Exhibitions 2026

The outcome of a month at Linkshouse, Birsay, Erin McQuarrie’s work uses naturally dyed fibres, drawn from foraged plants, to create a palette that echoes the colours and textures of the land. They are accompanied by text-based drawings inspired by Concrete Poetry to bring together language, textile and place.

Photographs by Orkney Camera Club of stone from the geological and archaeological past.

Images are woven with historical elements in Sanday-based artist Carolyn Dixon‘s series of prints and artist’s books. Based on extensive historical research, they explore the landscapes inhabited by particular men who left Orkney to later become enslavers. Alongside these are stories of some of the people of African descent whose lives they affected.

When the last of the islanders became too old to stay on Swona, they had to leave the cattle behind. Today the animals are flourishing, managing themselves as a herd and, remarkably, ancient ancestral behaviour patterns are returning, from the long-ago days before cattle were domesticated. Photographer Josh Spindler joins archaeologist Prof. Ingrid Mainland in a study of the UK’s only truly wild cattle herd, isolated for over 50 years. Photography, bone scans, and lab imagery combine to explore themes of wilderness, adaptation, and human withdrawal.

Sea Stories brings together objects which have rarely been on public display before, either from the Museum’s own stores or loaned from elsewhere, to explore Orkney’s deep-rooted maritime connections. From shipwrecks to sea magic, from whale strandings to the Southern Ocean, the thread which ties these objects together is their shared connection to the sea.

From a crystal set to a U-boat radio, the Museum at Kiln Corner is a treasure chest of social history. You can see early thermionic valve radios, and also Orkney’s first jukebox. There is the transmitter that sent wartime messages from Holm to Bomber and Coastal Command, and the Morse key that linked North Ronaldsay to the outside world in all weathers.