In 2008, Mike Collier was commissioned to make a Billboard for the side of the Waygood studios in Byker, Newcastle. For this piece, Mike Collier drew on the local, Northumbrian words for birds he had seen on walks in the Coquet Valley in Northumberland. Of course, Newcastle was once a part of the old kingdom of Northumbria, when the birds named here would, more than likely, have been seen on or around the Ouseburn that runs through Byker.

A study of bird names presents an ‘unpredictable and haphazard richness’ with names drawn from ‘the very roots of our language’ British Birds: Their Folklore, Names and Literature by Francesca Greenoak. The name Coquet comes from the Old English cocc, meaning ‘wild bird’.

W I T T O L: Wheatear
C H I T T Y: Meadow Pipit
Q U E E S T: Woodpigeon
C A L L O O: Curlew
K E E L I E: Kestrel
W I Z Z L E: Dipper

To coincide with the showing of the billboard, Mike Collier presented a small and related group of work in the gallery in Waygood called the Hanging Wall.

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As found on Mike Collier's website.