Meeting, observing and drawing the Wild Cattle of Chillingham Park by Lucy Boydell

Some of the rarest animals in the world, the iconic Wild Cattle of Chillingham have lived untouched by human interference in the same Northumberland parkland for hundreds of years.

Stories of the noble Chillingham herd, often mentioned with White Park, had occasionally popped up as I chatted with owners and keepers of the old English rare breeds I’d visited over the years to study for drawings, sounding mysterious and legendary and far far away. Seeing the print engraved by Thomas Bewick in 1789 added to the notion of otherworldly distance, an ancient animal held in another time.
It wasn’t until a veterinary expert of red deer, Dr John Fletcher of Automuchty, Scotland, was visiting my good friend and keeper of 400 head of red deer last year in Norfolk and was in the house when James was hanging a print I’d given him of a Hereford Bull when the descriptions suddenly crystallised into form via a suggestion from John,
”Well if she like drawing bulls, I can get her access to photograph the King Bull of the Chillingham herd tell her”, was the message that was excitedly and insistently rung through…”Yes please!” was the immediate answer and it was quickly arranged. 
 
I was filled in on the science to flesh out the picture of my subject:
Awash with liver fluke and yet entirely unaffected, and without one parasite found in the gut of an animal recently investigated after its demise due to old age, something evolutionary is happening. The immune systems of these mighty animals, in comparison to their counterparts reared in conventional farming systems, have evolved and adapted, supported by their similarly untouched organic ecosystem of the lush balanced nutrient-rich pastures of their ancient Northumberland hillside terrain resulting in a longer, healthier and happier lifespan.
They thrive in symbiotic balance, nature innately supporting itself.
I loved the holistic beauty of this and knew the cattle of Chillingham deserved their mystical reverence held by the experts in rare breed husbandry I’d encountered previously, and set off with gusto one hot summer’s day in early June the 9 hour drive from Norfolk to the far away lands of Northumberland.
 
Arriving at Chillingham, I was met by my expert guide for the day, Angus the park manager of the Chillingham Wild Cattle Association whose next 2 days were to be taken up delivering me through the lands of this living museum into the heart of the herd by open sided gator to stand, camera to muzzle, observing and understanding the ingredients of the remarkable Wild Cattle of Chillingham.
 
Angus swung by to pick me up from the Pavilion entrance adjacent to the estate at Chillingham castle whose lands have been home to the cattle since the 1300s, and I climbed aboard the humming gator, clad with cameras and a notebook as we slowly began our ascent through the Douglas fir lined track and out on the hillside pastures, ancient and beautiful to find the bovine gods and goddesses that make up this herd of living fossils of medieval cattle.
The structure of these beasts was immediately astonishing to behold; the vigorous magic of the upward-pointing, semi circular crescent lift of the horns, in both male and female, the closest resemblance to the painted cattle inscribed 18,000 years ago on the Palaeolithic cave walls in Lascaux.
I saw and felt the power and weight of their colossal bodies immediately which inspired the nomadic hunter-gatherers of the time to draw them as they moved with potent purpose across the pastures and felt connected to those ancestral artists, understanding the desire to record the males hoofing up turf and stooping to emit long, low, startling bellows, bowing like Samurai, followed by short, more urgent grunts, reverberating through the chest, conjuring the Celtic war trumpet the carnyx, announcing battle, a stirring warning of impending conflict perhaps… I felt the connection spanning across hundreds, no-thousands of years, older than the hills; it was a heady moment of time travel as I skiddaddled mentally through parallel timelines; civilisations; cultures.
Expansive. Incredible. Powerful. So unexpected and so moving. I started to pant.
 
Angus, thankfully being more present at that moment and experienced in reading the signs, quickly retired our gator to a vantage point at the foot of the hill to give way to his prediction of “impending argy bargy“ threatening on the brow, which in the end turned out to expire just as suddenly as it had begun. “Just the mature males keeping the younger ones in line”.
The communication through the herd was visceral.
 
Angus explained how the “teenage” males are “separated, chased off and exiled “by the patriarch to a distant field away from the females “to learn some manners”; excluded from the rest of the herd for a couple of years until they’ve learned to handle their own behaviours and allowed to reintegrate when, in his fatherly way, the king bull deems them ready to return. 
The females separate themselves to the lower grounds under the trees and near the stream to take off individually when calving, after which, one by one, the aunties are invited in by lowing, telepathy or vibration a few days after the arrival to inspect, accept or reject the newcomer. Any anomalies will be detected and eschewed, entry to the herd denied. Such is the force of self preservation in the herd which in human terms can feel harsh, but it was explained this is the law of nature; survival of the fittest being the reason the herd still exists.
 
All instincts that have run naturally through the herd and served them well over the past 500 years on the estate, without the need for human intervention of any kind. More often though, the calf is accepted, bonded with and celebrated, as the line of the herd continues.
A great part of my source material in understanding my subject comes from spending time with the people who care for them. Consistent devotion to keeping their charges alive, happy, healthy and thriving creates a fount of knowledge and stories which are shared enthusiastically; I really love this aspect of my work. The keepers of the herds are passionate people who care deeply about their animals and are happy to show them off to me. I see and feel the whole animal very quickly and understand instinctively which angle, what attitude, features, movements need to be depicted, I feel the light on, in and around them; the textures, the edges, the qualities that will explode in charcoal and chalk back on the board, and work closely with the keeper and the light to capture that. It’s high energy and a tuning in of mutual understanding, I love it, squarely in the moment, animal-lead, intense and electric.
 
Back in the studio, with the cow, the bull and the paper being white in white hot light in June, it became a technical challenge to depict them in charcoal and chalk that I relished.
 
With 3 months set aside in the studio, I began the journey to depict all the ingredients imbibed over the 2 day visit of the herd. I printed out A2 pictures of the cows and the bull and stuck them all over my kitchen wall, so they gazed over me, and I contemplated them for months as I ate.
 
Appearance, demeanour, presence, embodiment; the way the light fell across highlighting the length and thickness of the eyelashes and the wirey texture like a matted white scouring pad -highlighted along the ridge of the back; the softness and the strength; the sheer weight of the animal; the knowing look in the eye, looking out through that eye, through those lashes, the sun piercing the lashes, flicking flies and light out of my eye with those luscious thick lashes; remembering how we connected, the bull and I, he’d seen me ,came up to the gator bonnet and rubbed his ear and scratched his horn across the bumper with head tilted, all the while holding eye contact, air whooshing in and out of his glistening nostrils, the warmth and wetness of it, ribbons of drool, feeling him, hearing him, smelling him-all senses alive-the depth of the gaze and the gator rocking to his rhythm of his scratching and the vibrancy of the potent life force and the proximity to this powerful animal seeing me, making me shiver taking him in….centuries of watching through that eye; being him being; evolving out in the weather, the change of seasons on the Northumbrian hillside; through the storms, the howling wind, the beating sun, the ice and snow; stillness; being fully in the moment, moving in the sounds of the wind in the Douglas firs, the passing ravens and red kites; the weight of the horns, the heaviness, solidity, sharpness; the upward circular ring of horns, receiving frequency, transmitting frequency, ancient codes, ancient language, communicating with the planets, the sun and moon from the hillside. Carving up food; carving up shelter, defending, attracting, scoring the earth, leaving his mark.
 
Feeling being a cow in the herd, the heat of the field with the sun shining down on a hot midsummer day, feeling the sun hitting the coat, the cow’s coat, my coat, under the weight of that coat, being part of the herd over hundreds and hundreds of years from calf guided by its female elders passed on to the male to mate and continue the line, remembering breastfeeding my babies and feeling like a cow, manufacturing their sustenance, I felt like a cow then; watching the joy of the calves, scampering, playing, hiding and chasing each other, skidding to a halt to watch and stare, all under the patriarch and matriarch, ultimately to take itself off to die away from the others when the time comes and the role is transferred; the foraging, the survival, and remembering the community of it, the curiosity, the intelligence, the oneness and yet all individual characters with differing horns and vibrations; the black freckles sprinkled over the skin underneath the matted coat poking through; having a hoof so heavy sinking into the softness and springiness of the damp moss, under the brittle keratin outer layer the soft underneath of the foot feeling the wetness of the spongey pasture.
 
As I drew,I remember the cow spluttering droplets which hung on the whiskers around her mouth. Drawing her, understanding how the edges and layers of her nose were built,and then the depth of the layers and how the light fell across the layers creating different tones, for a moment I suddenly felt her breath as if I was the air inside the very nostril of that cow. Remembering the warmth of the breath, the breath for sensing, communicating, moisturising-it felt so alive. I drew the life force and the architecture housing it and the light falling across it.
 
I remember being so taken with the discovery that contrary to the notion I’d imagined on the drive up to Northumberland that the wild bull I was to be driven to observe would be possibly raucous and the ripple of anxious instruction that accompanied this thought, that I’d need to have my wits about me and bring my zoom lens as we surely would be photographing from a distance, he was in fact, whilst a good old hefty boy, extremely gentle; open hearted; calm; balanced; peaceful and happy; unfazed by closeup study, infact a curious, patient and generous wild bull. That was the last time I went to a photo shoot with expectations, learning from the experience instead in future to go with an open heart and mind, to respond with what presents-so much more fun, a lighter way to navigate being open to the magic presenting and the infinite intelligence of nature.
 
Angus explained that as the cattle have remained untouched by human hand since the Middle Ages, they have nothing to fear, and so show no fear.
I let that sink in for a field or so.
I knew how behaviour is often times a result of transference and projection from another; it was a first to put it in terms of a wild bull’s demeanour and drawing this psychological parallel became quite exquisite, and I then felt the sadness and heaviness of human energies transferred by and to others, whether intentionally or inadvertently, and it momentarily felt hopeless, but then I realised, crossing another field, a precious gift from this wild herd had been imparted: hold your own vibration, choose and vibrate a high energy; what others think is nothing to do with us; just be. Be discerning about what you let in. Be congruent. Profound downloads that afternoon, all ingredients that poured into the drawing of him, and I have the bull to thank for this, which humbles me, the ego being tamed by the freedom of a wild animal.
 
A snapshot of the vast language I conjure to feel and explore back in the studio as I move across the animal inside and out, travelling and flying with my subject emerging on the paper-all this to alchemise into in charcoal and chalk through my heart to be seen and felt by others; to say,Look at this;, look what I saw, do you see? I’ll show you how it felt, can you feel it too?

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