A film exploring the work of fibre artist Jeanette Sendler is one of the highlights to be found on the new Scottish Arts Council website.

The new website, which was launched by Patricia Ferguson MSP, Minister for Tourism, Culture and Sport, is a video and audio showcase of the arts in Scotland, a ‘what’s on guide' to arts events and a resource for arts professionals.

Speaking at the launch, the Minister said “This is a wonderful way to showcase Scotland’s strong arts scene.  There is enormous potential to promote Scotland through a comprehensive website like this which presents such an attractive and dynamic picture of the arts in Scotland.  I am intrigued to know that already people are logging on from Canada, the US, Australia, Germany, France, Italy, Japan, Spain and Austria."

Scottish Arts Council director Graham Berry said "We want our website to be first and foremost about the arts in Scotland, and then about how the Scottish Arts Council is championing the arts. Our new website does not replicate the websites of other arts providers, but provides a central resource which also signposts users and drives traffic to other websites.”

The film ‘Fibres of the Sea’ is on the Showcase section of the new site, and was a collaboration between Jeanette and filmmaker Eveline Nicholette during her Schools Crafts Residency in the Highlands earlier this year.  The film explores her work in her studio at Freswick Castle in Caithness portraying the landscape and showing the fibres (wool, goat hair, plant fibres and seaweed) which she took from the land and transformed into textiles.

The new website at www.scottisharts.org.uk includes a dedicated crafts section with information about aims, developments, projects, features, reports and an artist of the month.