Wrap artist has parcelled up sad cry from the heart

Sep 27 2008 by Tony Henderson, The Journal

Environment Editor Tony Henderson on the plight of the guardians of the North’s uplands.

ARTIST Ettie Spencer spent yesterday encasing an entire farmhouse in black plastic and bailer twine. The question Ettie was posing was as stark as it was simple – is hill farming in the North all wrapped up?

Ettie fears for the future of small farms, especially hill farms, and for the future of the northern uplands which they have created and help maintain.

It is these very uplands which give the remoter parts of the North East and Cumbria their character, which walkers and other visitors come to enjoy.

Croft Farm at Scarrowmanwick, between Brampton and Alston in Cumbria, was home to Ettie’s late father and her mother who, at 87, is now moving out.

And with her brother choosing not to take on the farm, the family links will be broken.

“It is the end of the line for our family in farming,” said Ettie.

“The house will probably become somebody’s countryside residence.

“It really indicates what is going on, with other small farms not passing on to the next generation. Many young people don’t feel that a living can be made from hill farming or from small farms generally.

“Hill farms are in big trouble. People are giving up after generations of hill farming.”

One of Ettie’s concerns is that as the number of small farms dwindle, the landscape will begin to change.

“I think it is important for people to realise what is going on because it is farming which has created the landscape we know and which people go into the countryside to enjoy,” she said.

“Small farmers are more in tune with the landscape and nature, rather than squeezing everything possible out of the land.

“It is a way of life, and has been for generations, but it seems that it is not sustainable any more.”

Wrapping up the building symbolises the plight of hill farming, said Ettie.

“As an 87-year-old farmer’s wife is finally moved out of the farmhouse, for the family, as well as most of the community, comes the realisation that this is the end of an era.

“Do we realise that if the countryside we all so love to visit can only survive if farming does and this does not mean agri-business?

“As an artist who grew up on farm, I can only raise the questions.”