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Margaret Soraya
Margaret Soraya is a professional landscape photographer based in the Highlands of Scotland. She has a passion for the coast and waves in particular and frequently travels solo around the Scottish islands in pursuit of the perfect wave.
I have been photographing the coast of the Outer Hebrides for maybe 17 years now, travelling back and forth at first for wedding photography bookings and lingering as long as I could afterwards. Holidays with my boys taken on the islands so I could be there to photograph …. any excuse really to be on the Hebrides. I moved there three years ago and built my gallery at my home in Geocrab a year later. It is now such a gorgeous calm space that I feel happy and proud every time I step foot in it. It runs mostly as an honesty gallery, something only the islands make possible. It gives people time and space to be there without pressure and allows me to continue my creative practice during the day and run my business.
Although I am known as a photographer and most of my business is based around photography, things have evolved recently and I have also been painting alongside. When I hung the images in the gallery I took the decision to give half the main wall to my paintings, and this has led to developing painting more and more. It is not a moving on from photography, it is about creating something complementary that challenges me and develops the same ideas that run through my photography. Leaning further into the subject, deeper, and being brave. The subject has always remained rooted in creating quiet, unassuming, calming images of the Hebridean coastline. My long exposures are created during winter swells mostly, but are translated into soft images printed on Hahnemühle German etching paper, and the most common statement from anyone entering the gallery is "are those photographs or paintings?"
I wonder if my early start as a painter at art college has influenced this subconscious style that I have allowed to develop naturally, without being influenced by trends or what everyone else is doing. Often overlooked in traditional photography circles, I love my work and that is all that matters to me.
I began the process of digging deeper into the meaning behind my photographs many years ago with my first solo exhibition at The Bosham Gallery in Chichester. Luke Whittaker encouraged me to write over and over, excavating the meaning in the work. Eventually the idea of quiet emerged time and again and my writing about introverts and the power of solitude for creativity became most apparent. This led to more reading, writing, and understanding of myself and why I create and how I create, and I have never stopped exploring this since. I have a lot to be grateful to Luke for in opening up these channels to discovering deeper meaning.
In 2024 I booked a joint exhibition with Carien Borst, a Dutch artist who runs retreats with me regularly. The idea of booking an exhibition and then having a goal to work towards is something I often do. So often the idea is not yet formed, just a trust that it will be. Carien named the exhibition on booking: Shaped by the Sea. A way of exhibiting work individually that shows how we are each shaped by the sea in the same way. It is a broad title that could open up thought and meaning for both of us. Typically, life is busy and the years slipped by, and I began considering it seriously at the beginning of 2026 and working towards it.
Following on with the theme of broadening the medium of expression, I have been writing more in the past few years as well. Something I have had to consciously practise, and partly the reason behind launching my Substack in 2024 where a regular schedule is necessary. In my old college notebooks I have images of the sea in Swansea, test strips for exposure from the days of film when I attended university for photography. Black and white waves on a page with words from poems written below them. I have been seeking a way of merging words with imagery for many years, so I decided to use this as a base and find a way to write on the walls surrounding the images.
In the end I had just two or three weeks to create the work for the exhibition after an unexpected change of plans. In that time I managed to paint, print, and frame all the small works, and the paintings now sit together with the photography on the walls. As for writing, I somehow wrote 20 poems that reflect on my relationship with the sea within a week. The poetry was written in response to thoughts around motherhood, my grandmother, the loss of my parents in recent years, the beauty of the Hebridean sea, being an introvert, discovering surfing and wild swimming, and living with chronic health conditions that the sea eases. All the work is also about learning to slow down, to be present, and to take time.
The paintings were made in response to the poems, in Geocrab in spring 2026. Standing in the finished exhibition, with the long exposures and the paintings hanging together in identical frames at the same scale, I think this is where the work has been heading all along.
'Shaped by the Sea' is an exhibition running throughout June 2026 at Talla Na Mara, Pairc Niseaboist, Isle of Harris HS33AE.
It brings together twelve photographic prints and twenty-five original paintings, mine alongside the work of Dutch artist Carien Borst, all rooted in our shared relationship with the Hebridean sea. The accompanying book, paintings and poetry by Margaret Soraya, is available at the exhibition and online via MargaretSoraya.com.
The Galerie, Geocrab, Isle of Harris HS3 3HB, is open throughout the season.
