A collection of nostalgic island photography by Margaret Fay Shaw
American Margaret Fay Shaw came to the Hebrides in 1921 as a teenager and spent the rest of her life on the West Coast capturing memorable images. Her collection represents a remarkable record of island life from a bygone age
“
She decided then and there to make discovering the ‘pristine’ version of these songs her life’s work
The images published here are a small representation of the lifetime’s work of American folklorist Margaret Fay Shaw, who adopted the Hebrides as her home in her twenties, writes Fiona Mackenzie, archivist for the National Trust for Scotland. Born in Pittsburgh in 1903, Margaret first came to Scotland in 1921, aged just 17 and it was in Helensburgh that she discovered Gaelic song at a recital by Marjory Kennedy Fraser.
She decided then and there to make discovering the ‘pristine’ version of these songs her life’s work. This she did, documenting her song-collecting life with images and film of her family and friends, animals, adventures and homes along the way.
We can see here in her images from the Aran Islands, Canna, Uist, Skye and St Kilda, the close connection she felt to the people, landscapes and livestock that surrounded her where she lived and travelled. She wrote that at the time, ‘(she) didn’t realise what she was doing….(she) just did it for the love of it.’
These beautiful and fascinating photographs form part of a collection of almost 9,000 images and slides, all kept in Canna House on the Isle of Canna, where Margaret Fay Shaw lived until her death in 2004. The negatives are currently being re-digitised to high resolution standards to increase accessibility, but over 100 of Shaw’s images can already be found in the book Eilean: The Island Photography of Margaret Fay Shaw.
We can see in her images the close connections she felt to the people, landscapes and livestock
Documenting her song-collecting life with images and film of family, friends, animals, adventures and homes, along the way