From the Mouths of the Caves - Listening to Hear Another Island’s Song

From the Mouths of the Caves, Listening to Hear Another Island’s Song explores how knowledge can be exchanged across island environments through visual art, and community engagement. Drawing inspiration from two elemental spaces – an ice cave in Svalbard and a sea cave on Iona – the project uses the materiality and symbolism of these sites as starting points for thinking with and through island ecologies.

Developed during a 2024 residency at Artica Svalbard by Scottish artist Mhairi Killin, the project comprises a body of artistic outcomes and an education project, which is the focus of this website.

The education project connects children in Longyearbyen with their peers on Iona & Mull, inviting them to explore how Scottish and Arctic island communities are linked by shared and dynamically changing oceanic systems and the unfolding narratives of climate change.

From the Mouths of the Caves works with art & science to support children in exploring their relationship with the sea and their islands, facilitating exchanges of coastal knowledge between different island communities. It cultivates empathy and ocean kinship through creative sensory learning experiences that enable children to express island life through ecology, cultural identity and language - from Gaelic to the international languages spoken in Svalbard.

The Arctic workshops will be delivered in partnership with Artica Svalbard, while the Iona and Mull workshops will be delivered in partnership with the National Trust for Scotland Ranger Service and the local community.

The design of the workshops has involved early collaboration with project scientists to co-create school workshops across both locations. Beginning with a pilot Gaelic-language workshop on Iona and Mull in November 2025, the project generated visual and audio material introducing the Hebridean islands to audiences in Svalbard.

A month of school workshops will follow in spring 2026 at Artica Svalbard and Longyearbyen Skole, with outcomes shared immediately with the local community at Artica and online. The exchange will then continue in summer 2026 with a month of school workshops in Iona and Mull, culminating in a public sharing at Iona Village Hall and online.

From the Mouths of the Caves, Listening to Hear Another Island’s Song reflects both artists’ multi disciplinary and place based approach to creating work and engaging with island communities. The project would not be possible without the generosity and knowledge share of Dr. Denise Risch, Dr. Kim Last, Dr Anuschka Miller, and Dr Laura Hobbs, Scottish Association for Marine Science; Dr Alasdair Whyte, Glasgow University; Professor Siri Granum Carson, Norwegian University of Science and Technology; and generous support from Artica Svalbard, Tidal ArtS, and Sparebankstiftelsen SpareBank Nord-Norge.

Finally, the artists would like to thank the pupils and teachers of Iona Primary School, Bunessan Primary School, Longyearbyen Skole, and Longyearbyen Kulturskole for all their enthusiasm and support.