Notes From Sheepland

It’s her eyes, she says. Perhaps they always signalled her destiny. When she returned to Ireland, after many years in Brussels, and sought advice about reviving her father’s farm, the expert she was speaking to at first suggested salad – there’s money to be made that way, these days. Then he looked into her ovine eyes and saw her future.

Orla Barry, artist, creative spirit, did not expect to find herself consumed by a passion for sheep. The opening scene of Cara Holmes’ documentary suggests there might be something supernatural about it. it has a folk horror vibe: in darkness, we hear the sound of ovine voices, then see them rushing and leaping through a narrow bean of light, the mass of their bodies pounding the earth as, still largely unseen, they crowd the frame. Discordant music plays, also conjuring up something of Ireland’s deep past; introduced by Neanderthal people, sheep have been on the island for around 7,000 years.

“I often forget which role I’m playing: farmer or artist,” says Orla, acknowledging how they have taken over her life. She bought 34 of them in 2009, all pedigrees. She wanted to be taken seriously, not just to play at farming. Elsey was the first of them and still has a place in the flock, along with Gillian, Big Daddy, Little Daddy, the Ugly Mutt, the Log, Michelle, Patsy, Iris, Ivy and more. “I think if I’d known what was coming I would have sold them all again immediately,” she says.

The only solution to Orla’s dilemma, the only way to find enough time for it all, was to make art about sheep. This film is something similar, a unique musing on human connection with animals and, obliquely, what it tells us about our own nature. There’s an organic quality to it, like something knitted together intentionally yet with varicoloured wool so that the eventual outcome could not be fully anticipated. Scenes in the fields sit side by side with footage of Orla sitting at her desk or swimming in the sea. We see some of her finished pieces, including creations which make physical form out of language. There is talk of the politics of agriculture and ecology. At one point, a choir of local mean appears, standing in front of a barn, singing Rise Up Shepherd And Farmer.

It’s not a good time to be invested in sheep. Nobody is buying wool to make clothing anymore; its price as plummeted. Sheep are now bred for meat. We witness the emotional impact on Orla of sending the yearlings and the old ewes off to slaughter – individuals she has known and loved. She has around half a ton of wool in her shed, towering like a haystack. What should she do with it? Again, she has to get creative, and the film reflects on the creative solutions needed everywhere, at every level, to cope with our changing world.

Who is closer to that world, who knows it better, than the farmers? How often do we listen to them? We listen, at least some of the time, to artists. Bringing these two things together gives Orla a power and a vital presence. In capturing that, Holmes does us all a favour.

Notes From Sheepland screened as part of Docs Ireland 2023.