‘Colm’ – an island journey with St Columba

Made in the anniversary year of St Columba’s birth (the year 521), this short film entitled ‘Colm’ is a collaborative, creative experimental project profiling the heritage, linguistic and artistic links between islands of the Scottish and Irish Gaeltacht, and Naomh Choluim Chille – St Columba. Those islands are the Isle of Canna in the Inner Hebrides, the Isle of Lewis, the most northern of the Western Isles, and Cape Clear/the Aran islands in Ireland.

Canna archivist and Gaelic singer Fiona J Mackenzie originally intended this project to be a physically located (on Canna and Lewis), devised multimedia-performance project but Covid-19 instead has encouraged Fiona and her creative partners to adapt, research and develop the strategy beyond the confines of a conventional stage and audience. Underlining Fiona’s continuing strategy of demonstrating how ‘the old’ can stimulate and develop ‘the new’ by using the Canna archives as inspiration, each of the partners have been able to explore and develop their own creative processes, whilst also working with the potential for new online audiences. Music and archive from all the islands works together to explore what connects these islands, so similar in nature, heritage, landscape and culture, yet so intrinsically different.

John Lorne Campbell of Canna firmly believed that Canna was the ‘summer home’ of St Columba, known as ‘Hinba’ or ‘Himba’ in Columba’s diaries and indeed the island has many archaeological sites which provide evidence to back this theory up. The Celtic Cross itself is situated on a Columban monastic site.

In this film, the story of St Columba – and his journeys and the connections within the Canna archives – is used as a focal point to pull together the strands of culture, history and language. It presents to a contemporary audience the picture of a common heritage and community with individual characteristics.

Two well-known musicians from Lewis, James Duncan Mackenzie and Katie Mackenzie, explore ‘St Colm’s Isle’ on Lewis and its musical and linguistic links to St Columba, whilst exploring the musical links with the Irish Gaeltacht. Using contemporary and archive footage and sound archive, Fiona herself explores the Celtic cross on Canna, St Columba’s Chapel and his likely approach to the island from his boat. Also included are images by Margaret Fay Shaw of her travels to Iona in the 1920s. The Canna Cross features as a focus on the potential interpretation of the Celtic symbols carved into it, as an early form of musical notation. A new clarsach composition by Katie, based on the notation, is heard in the film. Community screenings of the film will be held in 2022.

We hope that you enjoy ‘Colm’ and that it inspires discussion. We also hope it may inspire you to explore further the language and heritage of some of our beautiful Scottish and Irish islands.

We gratefully acknowledge the support of Bòrd na Gàidhlig and the Colm 1500 initiative in the production of this project.