Fogo Island

A remote island far away from far away’, Newfoundland’s Fogo Island is a flat granite-scape where you are guaranteed to leave your comfort zone far behind…

I’m returning for the silence. A journey as arduous and splintered from the rest of its native North American continent as it is from the UK – two planes, two road trips, one ferry (if MV Veteran is in luck with sailing the Atlantic rollers) – Newfoundland’s Fogo Island offers a solitude that’s damn hard to beat. It’s easy to be smitten with the ‘remote island off a remote island, far away from far away’ as it’s often dubbed, even if Fogo is not easily habituated; a flat, often pink-hued granite-scape near the top of the world, hugged by a deep inkblot of an ocean with icebergs swaggering into view and gnarly weather captured in seven say-it-as-it-is seasons.

‘The pace of life is slower here and it’s no exaggeration to say that there is a “Berry” or “Pack Ice” season – these
things affect everyday life on the island and there is a rhythm that is more in tune with them than most places in the world,’ explains Iris Stünzi, residency programme coordinator for Fogo Island Arts (FIA), which invites 15 or so artists annually to its four groundbreaking studios. The Ontario native is referring, of course, to the arrival of October’s two dozen varieties of berries (my first trip witnessed this serious business with residents milling over blueberries and partridgeberries) and the time when late winter’s sea ice grips harbours and snowmobiles take over.

‘If you’re coming from a city especially, the expanse of space and silence on Fogo can be an escape,’ she continues of the island that’s four times the size of Manhattan yet has only 2,400 residents. For artists, Stünzi sees it as an opportunity to get away not only from their everyday life but ‘perhaps out of their comfort zone’.

Well out, it seems. Since starting in 2011, more than 100 artists have passed through FIA’s programme with the natural landscape often shaking up their usual palettes or medium. Take the Canadian artist Mark Clintberg, a Calgary citydweller who learnt, from a local fisherman, how to create a net before putting his spin on the craft. The piece, Not the one but there is no one else, showcased a hand-knotted creation using braided poly twine, along with polysteel twisted and phosphorescent ropes. Wittily, there’s a photograph recording the only time the net was
untangled into water in Fogo showing the titular words.

This June day it’s about two degrees (it can hit 20 at this time of year) and we’re cycling on Highway 334 – the quiet punctuated more often by the sound of seabirds than by cars. We pass small houses and stunted woods. Peppering the island, however, each of the off-the-grid studios are bold, contemporary nods to Newfoundland architecture: stilts, say, reminiscent of those from the fishing ‘stages’ where cod was salted. (Preserving food is a lifeblood for communities in the leaner months: the ‘hungry month of March’ was a real thing.)

Abandoning our bikes nonchalantly by the side of the road, we hit gently tamed trails towards the spaces. For the small twisted Tower Studio, there’s a wooden boardwalk (only 30 centimetres wide to avoid damaging the lichens clinging to the rock below). All designed by Newfoundland-born now Norway-based architect Todd Saunders, there’s also the more expansive Long Studio near the Joe Batt’s Arm community, designed for large-scale or performance work and the Bridge Studio near Deep Bay (which boasts a lake and often caribou for company). On the way, we clamber to the top of Brimstone Head for a 360-degree view across the ocean that shows why it’s the spot for the tongue-in-cheek Flat Earth Society heralding Fogo as one of the corners of the Earth (with a museum, to boot). With the fieriness of the hike and outcrop, you can see one reason why Portuguese sailors – it sits on the old trading routes around
the Atlantic –named this island Fogo (meaning fire).

Equally rising out of the land like a mirage, Fogo Island Inn is an extraordinary spaceship-style hotel that also sits on stilts. With worldwide residents encouraged into the 29 beautiful bedrooms then out into the community (hiking, foraging, berry picking, fishing), the Inn’s valiant desire for ‘social purpose’ is writ large. The creation of entrepreneur and Fogo Island native Zita Cobb (who calls herself simply ‘the Innkeeper’), the profits from this accolade-adorned hotel, also designed by Saunders, are channelled back to the charity that owns it: the Shorefast Foundation. Ensuring a robust future for Fogo Island, long in decline with dwindling cod stocks and emigration (Cobb herself returned after making money in the fibre optics’ world), it launched an ‘economic nutrition’ label to show where the money goes. With everything inside focused on the island – from the homemade patchwork quilts to tapestries – around 65 per cent of a guest’s bill heads to Fogo versus three per cent to the rest of the world.

Crossing the ‘highway’ from the Inn, we saunter into the original home of the Society of United Fishermen, now the island’s extraordinary Woodshop, another of its social enterprises. Among the lathes, planes, saws and, of course, sawdust, there are stacks of wood (yellow birch predominantly), which still come from the west coast of Newfoundland, as well as New Brunswick and Quebec.

It’s ground zero for how craftsfolk here ‘look for new ways with old things or new ways of thinking with old knowledge’, explains Nathan Ball, the store’s customer service and operations manager. Art and craft, 21st century-style; new twists, often, on how Fogo culture grew, to a large extent still does, out of the fishery. (Cod, crab and lobster still reign, however, as this month’s moniker, Trap Berth season, attests.)

Its traditional boats, known as punts, were made from naturally curved, and easier-to-split, spruce and tamarack. ‘It is what allowed the communities to persist,’ Ball enthuses. ‘Now we use the same way of collecting curved wood to make our leading product: the Punt chair.’ Notably, the locals swear that to avoid rotting wood the pieces must be harvested during a certain phase of the moon’s cycle. ‘Fogo Islanders have gathered centuries of knowledge of how to work with wood and how to use what is available to etch out a fulfilling life,’ he continues. ‘Using these skills to develop another leg on our economy helps by lending stability to the primary industry of our island – the fishery.’

Put another way, when historically Newfoundland’s ports meant they couldn’t lay hands on materials needed for a project, recycling became de rigueur. Pop into most homes, and you’ll spy a barrel (which used to hold, say, flour for the winter months) transformed into a curved hull chair. The Woodshop’s Bertha chair is its modern-day version. Found in most of the Inn’s rooms, designer Donna Wilson was honouring Bertha Wilson, Canada’s first female Supreme Court Justice.

Being ‘far away from far away’ isn’t always easy, but undoubtedly forms part of the inventiveness of the people here. Including just about any plate we’re served by Inn’s executive chef Jonathan Gushue – whether it’s waking up with a delightful lobster stew or cod cheeks with Japanese knotweed or the evening’s partridgeberry chocolate tart. ‘There is great ingenuity on this island,’ says the chef, who returned to his Newfoundland roots after honing his skills in the kitchens of the Berkeley and Four Seasons Hotel in London (under Jean-Christophe Novelli). ‘You’re always telling the story of the past, present and future with the food today.’

The story, it seems, is of an island rooted deeply in nature. While tourists may float in for a novel experience, however, it’s important that longer-term artists realise what they may have signed up for. Fogo Island, Stunzi says, offers challenges: from the fact that there’s no art store to the harshness of the elements. ‘It’s important to keep in mind that this is a real place, with real people, beyond simply being an escape,’ she proffers. ‘Part of coming here is also to adapt to these new experiences.’ For Ball, that being apart has always been part of the islanders’ unique DNA and inspiration. ‘Its isolation, until recently, has allowed us to develop differently from anywhere else in the world,’ he says. ‘Understanding and using these skills helps us by connecting to our history.’

‘It’s important to keep in mind that this is a real place, with real people. Part of coming here is to adapt to these new experiences’

Later that evening the night sky creeps in and the wood burns brightly for the ‘boil-up’ (local slang for a barbecue). Seventh-generation foragers burst right on cue into a lilt-y sea shanty – sociability, Stünzi pipes up, is as much an island ritual as a chance to spend time in the natural world and quiet. Isolation gives birth to an extraordinary sense of togetherness. ‘The importance of place, the interconnectedness of places, is something that we think about a lot here,’ she concludes. ‘Many artists have said that when they first arrive, time seems to go slower, but towards the end of their residency, they found it flew by.’ Something Stunzi knows full well: landing here for a quick year or so, she’s now clocked up seven: ‘This place cast its spell on me.’

If we hunger to reconnect with something we feel we have lost, we might just feel like finding it again is second nature on Fogo Island. woodshop.ca; fogoislandarts.ca; fogoislandinn.ca

‘If you’re coming
from a city especially,
the expanse of space
and silence on Fogo
can be an escape...’

WORDS LUCY HYSLOP | PHOTOGRAPHS FINN BEALES