Roslin Gunpowder Mill sits at a turn in the River North Esk in the county of Midlothian. Here an extraordinary gorge cuts deep into a former ocean floor revealing layers of sedimentation; sandstone and mudstone seams interspersed with the remnants of ancient river channels. Founded in 1804 the Gunpowder Mill produced munitions for the Napoleonic and Boer Wars, World War I and World War II. A beautiful ruin set in woodland grove it gives little indication of its contribution to the modern world.
Janus is the Roman god of beginnings and endings, of gates and doorways. One of the Liminal Deities, he exists at the threshold between states of being. In the ancient world the dead did not travel far from the living, residing close-by in the ground beneath our feet. Cut stone is both beautiful and disturbing. In a gorge or a quarry, we are not on the world but in it. Drawing out the lines of these sedimentary and metamorphic conditions reveals the delicate and contingent qualities of the earth, it’s surprising vulnerabilities. In the Roman Forum the gates of the Temple to Janus were closed in times of peace. In times of war, they stood open.
- the artist