Ruthe Davies, Scotland Branch Secretary
Dalkeith reaching oak.
Calder hollow-hearted beech. Charcoal on paper.
Trees are beautiful, and frequently feature in artwork. But while many artists show trees with a stylistic appearance and as part of a wider landscape scene, Tansy Lee Moir depicts them as individuals, using a unique portrait style.
I saw her work in a local exhibition and was fascinated by her way of capturing a tree’s character, so I made a visit to her South Queensferry studio to learn more about her work.
Tansy draws parts of veteran trees. For some time when she tried to draw trees she was overwhelmed by their colossal complexity. She had a breakthrough with her art when she saw a large old beech reduced to a monolith. With the crown gone, the tree’s magnitude was stripped away and her artistic focus could close in on the trunk.
The trunk of a tree is where its age and experience accumulate. Internally the annual rings build, and externally the bark matures and features develop such as decay and reaction wood, bringing irregularity and intrigue. When a tree starts to retrench in old age, shrinking down for its final years, the trunk may be all that remains of its long-term structure. The trunk is the heart of a tree, the part that persists through time. It is the part closest to humans and receives the closest examination when an arboriculturist carries out an inspection. It is where most fungal fruiting bodies will be found, and where defects can carry the highest significance for the tree’s future. The shapes and scars on a veteran’s trunk shape it into a thing of awe-inspiring, grotesque beauty. In the same way as the ageing process shapes a human face, the trunk of a tree tells the story of its many decades of life.
It is this story that we see visually depicted in Tansy’s work, with dramatic winter light highlighting the tree’s unique features in an approach that feels very much like portraiture. Those features are adaptations to the tree’s own individual experience of the world – changes and movement at a rate too slow for us to perceive. Tansy captures them in a way that is suggestive of flowing water or dancing figures, reminding the viewer that the tree which may appear to be still as a rock is a moving and breathing being. I see this visual interpretation and feel more aware of the tree’s dynamism and its connection with the past and future.
Cascade. Charcoal on paper.
Tansy at work.
On solid ground. Oil on canvas.
There is a very human element to some of her work. Flesh-like shapes sometimes emerge from the tree’s contours, drawing out the parallels between human and tree forms, blurring the lines between flora and fauna. This human element is also explored in her series of drawings depicting arborglyphs – carved tree graffiti from decades or even centuries ago, another intersection between human culture and trees.
Tansy attends arboricultural conferences and webinars and seeks out connections with tree professionals. She credits much of her work’s value to this process, and in particular her ability to move beyond landscape art into her signature style of intimate individual tree portraits. Her arboricultural understanding is transmitted to the viewer and her passion for trees travels with it. I find that seeing her pictures makes me look at trees differently.
The message of Tansy’s art, and her juxtaposition of the arboricultural and the human, reflects the practice of urban forestry, where our work is to bring people and trees together in harmony. This professional mission is shared by artists like Tansy. We are part of the same movement.
Find out more at www.tansyleemoir.co.uk
Tansy Lee Moir’s studio.
This article was taken from Issue 204 Spring 2024 of the ARB Magazine, which is available to view free to members by simply logging in to the website and viewing your profile area.