Alex McEwan and Sue Macartney

Alex and Sue are the people behind community interest company Albatross Arts, who aim to inspire, make and empower local communities in order to connect people and confront some social challenges of the day. This interview has been provided by Inspiralba as a contribution to the GrowBiz and REDS Year of Stories activities — telling the stories of rural enterprise, micro businesses and the self employed.

“There is a huge amount of creativity here. There is a rich and diverse knowledge and practice across the creative industries. It’s mind-boggling how much is here.”

Sue Macartney

Where in rural Scotland are you based and what do you love about living and working there?

Alex: We are based in Southern Argyll and Bute. We like being here because we are on the edge of something. I like being near the coast but we are also close enough to cities and airports that we can easily reach the bigger cities. Argyll and Bute is such a diverse region, it has everything.

Sue: There is a huge amount of creativity here. There is a rich and diverse knowledge and practice across the creative industries. It’s mind-boggling how much is here. We have the sea, the countryside, access to cities and transport links.

What is the biggest challenge you face or have faced running your business in rural Scotland?

Alex: The pandemic wasn’t helpful. But it meant that we had to step up and we did that with alarming speed. Living in a rural area has some wonderful benefits because you can reach little pockets of society and have an impact on a small scale. You can take that learning and scale it up. In turn you can take urban understanding and scale it to fit into a rural situation. But I think if you are always in an urban environment you miss out on those nuances of working in smaller communities. But I think the two can be very influential. Broadband is also sometimes an issue.

Sue: For us, a lot of the people we are working with were isolated before the pandemic. The pandemic helped them in a way, as there was more available to them and many of them went online. So for us, as a business, we were able to bring our service online and reach many more people. It was difficult, but it helped us and helped organisations think differently and realise that moving content online really helped people who could not leave the house.

Alex: There is also something to be said about creativity in a rural area, you have little pockets of creativity and because there are lots of pockets of communities, there is more likely to be that sharing of skills and resources and information and traditions. That’s a lovely thing because that connects everyone and that goes with our ethos. We have a focus on a sense of place. It’s nice to take it out to the world but it’s also nice to have a sense of place. That’s why it’s nice to do projects locally and then going bigger and then coming back again.

What’s been your biggest achievement so far?

Alex: Growing the business to year 3 to a nice solid place has been a massive achievement and the investment in relationships amongst the team and within other organisations and colleagues.

Sue: We worked with Inspiralba to put together some financial models and forecasting. The forecasting was quite ambitious and at the outset did not seem manageable. But we thought “We will leave it there and see what we can do.” But we reached the targets that we set ourselves. Even to sit back now and reflect on that is amazing because we have reached our goals. Albatross has developed some amazing partnerships. There is a great deal we can pat ourselves on the backs for if we reflect but we rarely do that as there isn’t enough time.

Alex: I think one of our main achievements is that we haven’t become downtrodden, we are still ambitious and passionate about what we do.

How does where you live inspire your creativity?

Sue: I think for me, I am not a creative person but creativity to me and the work I do is very different to what you would typically think of as creativity and what Alex as an artist would do. Living here in this amazing area gives you headspace. I have to do a lot of writing, thinking and planning so being able to take a break, step outside and be surrounded by nature, gives me energy and inspiration. And talking to people and getting the sense of community that we have living in A and B. Its inspiring and I don’t think you’d get that from living in an urban area, maybe in a different way. That’s how I get my inspiration, Alex and I will often go out for a walk when everything gets a bit too much.

Alex: I would agree with Sue, it’s definitely the people, it’s definitely the place. It’s the land and the sea, the geography and the big skies and the space to breathe. Plus the interesting weather! That does really well for your wellbeing. If I wasn’t here and was still living in an urban environment. I don’t think I’d still have the energy or the groundedness I have now. It’s rejuvenating and inspiring.