Cocken­zie Power Station

With over 150 art­works this venue has the largest annual mixed media exhi­bi­tion in East Loth­ian. Reg­u­lar fes­ti­val sup­port­ers, Hadding­ton Art Group, Richard DeMarco, Sandy Mof­fat and oth­ers are included in this dis­play of some of Scotland’s finest artists.

  • Damian Callan returns with a draw­ing cre­ated specif­i­cally for the fes­ti­val. Over 7 feet by 7 feet this extra large char­coal piece fea­tures some famil­iar motifs from other works – chil­dren, boats, a har­bour and light­house, and ships at sea.
  • Jenny Pope is an artist based at the Edin­burgh Ceramic Stu­dio at Coburg House in Leith. She is an avid beach­comber and some work reflects ideas around walk­ing and col­lect­ing man­made objects and also bones. Explor­ing the vul­ner­a­bil­i­ties of our bod­ies and the change processes related to illness/wellness, focussing on con­trol of our ‘breath­ing’. Her cur­rent work com­bines the struc­ture of bones and rock for­ma­tions with eroded surfaces.
  • Mark I’Anson (art­work on the front cover of the brochure) best describes his work him­self “At the time of my first fish­ing related exhi­bi­tion, Drifter (2006), I wrote, opti­misti­cally, that it was ‘part of an ongo­ing project’ while in real­ity hav­ing no idea what might come next. It turned out to be a book of his­tor­i­cal pho­tos enti­tled ‘Scotland’s East Coast Fish­ing Indus­try’ (2009). Next a vague notion that I’d like to draw the com­plete boat as opposed to what could be seen above the water­line led to an ongo­ing series (of which these 3 Har­bour paint­ings are per­haps the last) ‘Like Fish out of Water’” These fea­tured in a 2010 exhi­bi­tion (Open Eye Gallery, Edin­burgh) and book, ‘Always Boats and Men’ in col­lab­o­ra­tion with poet Angus Mar­tin. Now I find myself once again ner­vously say­ing “This is part of an ongo­ing project!’

The pre­view show will be held on Fri­day 27 May from 17.30 to 19.00. Meet the artists and take this early oppor­tu­nity to acquire an orig­i­nal work of art. The Rosses and the Cast­aways will pro­vide the enter­tain­ment with songs and music of the sea.

Pho­to­space

Jon Eland returns with his por­traits and the project result­ing from the pho­towalk last year. Together
with this dis­play will be an exhi­bi­tion of the work of a num­ber of pho­tog­ra­phers new to the fes­ti­val. The 3 Har­bours Pho­towalk, for expe­ri­enced and begin­ner pho­tog­ra­phers, will again cap­ture the mix­ture of the colour of the fes­ti­vals and the every­day life of the local area. As a spe­cial extra this pho­towalk will coin­cide with another run­ning at the Saltaire Arts Trail in West Yorkshire.

Expand­ing on the pho­towalk – rov­ing reporters will cap­ture the flavour of the fes­ti­val. Walks, talks and work­shops will be held and guests will be invited to blog with us on this site.

Cuthill Park

This venue will see a hive of activ­ity with the Mural Fest, The Big Lunch and The Coastal Food Fair.

This is the fifth year of the Mural Fest. Six selected mural­ists will be draw­ing and paint­ing through­out the week­end inspired by the poem ‘Scary Haven’ writ­ten by Prestoun­grange Poet Lau­re­ate, John Lindsay.

The Big Lunch inspired an esti­mated one mil­lion peo­ple to have lunch with their neigh­bours across the UK last year and this year it coin­cides with the 3 Har­bours Arts Fes­ti­val. An out­door pic­nic, every­one welcome.

The Open Houses Trail

Fol­low the trail and view the art­work and meet the artists in the com­fort of a home in Cocken­zie and Port Seton. The core team of The Bat­tle of Pre­ston­pans Tapes­try, the ‘panel beat­ers’, will wel­come you in to the home of fel­low ‘panel beater’, Kate Edmunds.

Kate, Dorie Wilkie, Mary Richard­son, Shona McManus, Sarah McCabe, Meg Por­te­ous and Catri­ona Wilkie will be dis­play­ing their own unique pieces dur­ing the fes­ti­val and you can see them work­ing on an embroi­dery of Cocken­zie House, from an illus­tra­tion by Gareth Jones.

This tal­ented group have embroi­dered words and pic­tures for the intro­duc­tion pages in this fes­ti­val brochure. Mari­etta Di Ciacca, another ’panel beater’, embroi­dered the 3 Har­bours Arts Fes­ti­val logo. Many thanks for the beau­ti­ful work done on such a tight deadline.

Local gal­leries

Both the Seashore Gallery (sit­u­ated near the ancient Boat Shore in Cocken­zie) and the Har­bour Gallery (found fac­ing the pic­turesque work­ing har­bour in Port Seton), are well worth a visit. The owner artists, Fiona Crom­bie and Alis­tair Hamil­ton have a var­ied selec­tion of art­work in the galleries.

Don’t for­get to visit the Craft Fairs in Mil­len­nium Park on Sat­ur­day 28th May and Sat­ur­day 4th June.

Boatie Blest

The annual exhi­bi­tion of hand-crafted model boats includes two mod­els built this year, a model of ‘Boatie Rows’ by Stu­art Mack and a model of ‘Boatie Blest’ by Bob McNeil. Each is a replica of the life-sized skiffs built and rowed at Port Seton this year.