October 2003 ArtsFolk: Duncan MacInnes (1)

DUNCAN MACINNES was born in distant Hertfordshire, but Skye was very much a part of his family roots. His father was a Skyeman, and Duncan spent childhood holidays on the island before moving there permanently in the late 60s. He took a degree in Civil Engineering and Physical Geography, and worked as a Countryside Ranger on the Clan Donald estate for 16 years until he opted to go freelance.

Duncan MacInnes

His early involvement in the arts came through participation in local amateur drama and music, including folk music and the local Gaelic choir (although he admits to not being a fully-fledged speaker of the language). His involvement in promoting arts events came about largely by chance.

“The promotion end of it began when one group from Edinburgh wanted to come up to Skye, and they happened to have my name as a contact for the village hall. They came up and did their own show in the village hall, and it was fun. The next stage was getting slowly sucked into the old Highland Council system, when Peter Quillam-Cane was the arts officer.

“He was the one who nurtured various local promoters, like Jean Urquhart at the Ceilidh Place and Willie Wilson at Lyth Arts Centre. That group was really the early days of what became PAN. I can’t really praise Peter’s approach enough – he found out what was going on locally and nurtured it, rather than marching in and saying right, here’s what you’re going to do.

“I had worked at Clan Donald for about 16 years, and gave it up about 12 years ago to go freelance, and I got more involved with arts development then. A little before that, maybe 1988 or so, I had started getting involved more in actively promoting rather than very occasionally receiving visiting groups. I started putting on things at the visitor centre at Clan Donald – I was countryside ranger and self-appointed arts officer!

“We quickly built up a supportive local audience, and some of those people who were coming along were keen to get involved and turn it into more of a community project than a one-man band, and that was when SEALL Arts (Sleat Entertainments for All) was started, in May 1991. The Skye Festival began that year as well.”

SEALL is run by a committee of six, and promotes a variety of different arts forms, other than visual arts. They used a variety of local venues in its early years, but linked up with Sabhal Mòr Ostaig when their new buildings became available in the mid-90s. The college became their “spiritual home”, and Duncan believes it represents an exemplary partnership between a community group and the education sector.