The Edinburgh Art Festival has announced the line-up for Scotland’s largest annual celebration of visual art which takes place throughout August. This event offers the chance to experience the best contemporary Scottish artists in the context of exhibitions with International artists and movements of the 20th Century and earlier.
The festival attracs over 250,000 visits each year, Edinburgh Art Festival brings together the capital’s leading galleries, museums and artist-run spaces, alongside new public art commissions by establised and emerging artists and an innovative programme of special events. The vast majority of the festival is free to attend.
This year’s festival includes over 45 exhibitions showcasing some of the best contemporary art alongside important artists and works from modern and historical periods, in the city’s leading galleries, museums and artist-run spaces.
Major solo exhibitions by leading contemporary artists including Gabriel Orozco, Gregor Schneider and Lawrence Weiner and 2 major exhibitions celebrating the artistic collaborations of Jeremy Deller and Franz West
A thematic programme of new publicly sited commissions across the city, featuring Christine Borland with Brody Condon; Peter Liversidge; Robert Montgomery; Sarah Kenchington and Katri Walker
In-depth art historical surveys including an extensive presentation from the international Condé Nast photographic archives, a major examination of Man Ray’s portraits dating from 1916 to 1968 and fresh looks at the mythology of ‘Mary, Queen of Scots’ and of ‘Witches and Wicked Bodies’, as told by artists from Francisco de Goya to Kiki Smith
The best mid and early career artists including new work by Rachel Maclean, Ilana Halperin and Ângela Ferreira, and shows in some of Edinburgh’s most interesting visual art venues supporting emerging practice, including Rhubaba, Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop, GARAGE, The Old Ambulance Depot and an off-site project by Collective
Sorcha Carey, Director, Edinburgh Art Festival (EAF) today announced details of EAF’s 10th edition this August showcasing the best visual art at the heart of the world’s festival city. One of Europe’s most important annual visual art festivals, the 2013 programme will bring together more than 45 of the best UK and international contemporary art and blockbuster art historical exhibitions across 30 of the city’s museums and galleries, artist-run and pop-up spaces. The Festival will feature a roster of world-class visual artists at all stages of their careers, from Turner Prize winners and nominees to the best early career artists.
2013 will see EAF’s most ambitious programme of new commissions to date – with a series of new publicly sited artworks based around the theme of ‘Parley’. ‘Parley’ invites artists and audiences to consider art as an agent of discussion, debate and social change and will be animated throughout the festival month by a programme of talks, lectures and screenings.
Sorcha Carey, Director, Edinburgh Art Festival, said: “For our tenth year we’re delighted to introduce our strongest programme yet, featuring the best in contemporary, modern and historic art in galleries across the capital. Our most ambitious commissions programme to date will continue to bring significant new works by leading visual artists to the heart of the festival city.’
Fiona Hyslop, Cabinet Secretary for Culture and External Affairs, said: “Now in its tenth year, the Edinburgh Art Festival is firmly established as a vital component in the success of Edinburgh’s wider festival programme, celebrating some of the very best visual art from Scotland and around the world, and promoting our fantastic culture, exceptional talent and our reputation as a creative nation to audiences from around the globe. The 2013 programme is a vibrant, exciting and diverse mix of exhibitions, events and publicly sited artworks. The innovative ‘Parley’ programme – supported by the Scottish Government’s Expo fund – will invite audiences to consider the role art plays in inspiring creative thinking, debate, dialogue and discussion.”
The Fruitmarket Gallery’s summer exhibition focussing on Gabriel Orozco will look deeply into the mechanics of one of the world’s foremost international artist’s thinking and working processes, taking Orozco’s 2005 painting ‘The Eye of Go’ as a starting point for examination of his practice as a whole. Summerhall will present world-renowned composer Michael Nyman’s remake of Dzgia Vertov’s film Man with a Movie Camera alongside the original film; a survey of multiples by Lawrence Weiner; and a major new installation by Gregor Schneider entitled Süsser Duft (Sweet Scent). British contemporary artist Peter Liversidge always starts with a proposal typed on an Olivetti typewriter and his exhibition at Ingleby Gallery for EAF will unpick the powerful and strange story of ‘Ein Handschuh’, a suite of etchings from 1881 by the Austrian Symbolist Max Klinger, which tell the story of a lost glove, dropped by a beautiful, roller-skating woman.
Two major shows examining artists’ collaborations will open as part of the Art Festival this August. Inverleith House will present the first exhibition of works made by the great Austrian artist Franz West (1947-2012) ‘Mostly West: Franz West and Artist Collaborations’; including Douglas Gordon, Sarah Lucas, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Anselm Reyle and Rudolf Stingel. Jupiter Artland will present an exhibition by Jeremy Deller featuring his celebrated work with long-standing collaborator Alan Kane as well as a one-off live performance by Steel Harmony. Scaffold, Sam Durrant’s acclaimed sculpture, first shown at dOCUMENTA (13) Kassel, will make its UK premiere at Jupiter Artland.
EAF’s annual commissions programme is at the heart of the festival and brings new public artwork by world-class artists to the city. Marking its 10th anniversary in 2013, EAF will present an innovative programme of new works for the public realm, supported by the Scottish Government’s Edinburgh Festivals Expo Fund and commissioned around the theme of ‘Parley’, exploring the capacity of art to generate dialogue, and to create a space for debate and disagreement.
True to the spirit of Parley, several of the commissions in 2013 depend directly on conversation and collaboration for their creation, whether between artists themselves or between an artist and the public. In August 2004, just as EAF launched, staff began to move into Scotland’s new parliament building and the architects were clear that they sought to create “not a building in a park or garden but a form for gathering people”. This offers a resonant counterpoint for Parley, which, like the parliament building, celebrates art which offers a form of gathering; a site for debate, discussion and exploration.
For Parley, 1997 Turner Prize nominee Christine Borland is developing a major new collaborative project with New York based artist Brody Condon, whose performative works have been staged at leading venues across the US including MOMA, PS1, the New Museum and LACMA LA. Poet-artist Robert Montgomery will create a new site-specific sculpture for Edinburgh, the first major installation of his work in the country of his birth.
Peter Liversidge invites the city’s institutions to participate in a collective welcome, replacing their official or corporate flags with a white flag designed by the artist, simply bearing the word ‘Hello’. Sarah Kenchington, who is known for her remarkable mechanical instruments, will collect hundreds of decommissioned organ pipes from around the UK to create a new organ which will be sited in Edinburgh’s Trinity Apse: a 15th century church, which itself has been dismantled and rebuilt brick-by-brick, moved from its original site where Ingleby Gallery now stands.
Further commissions will include the presentation of a new film by Katri Walker, co- commissioned with NVA as part of their Speed of Light programme; and a special Edinburgh edition of The Complaints Choir (a world-wide project created by Finnish artists Tellervo and Oliver Kotcha Kalleinen), led by contemporary musicians and composers Daniel Padden and Peter Nicholson of the One Ensemble, which invites Edinburgh residents to come together and sing their complaints out loud.
‘Mary, Queen of Scots’, a major exhibition showing only at the National Museum of Scotland, will tell the dramatic story of one of Scotland’s most famous and controversial royal figures. At Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, ‘Witches and Wicked Bodies’ will examine how witches and witchcraft have been depicted by artists over the past 500 years, including works by Albrecht Dürer, Francisco de Goya and William Blake, alongside pieces by 20th century artists such as Paula Rego, Kiki Smith and Ana Maria Pacheco. Pacheco will also feature in a show of her sculptures and prints at St Albert’s Catholic Chaplaincy. Also at Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, ‘From Death to Death and Other Small Tales’ will be on display, bringing together works from the D.Daskalopoulos Collection, one of the most important private collections of modern and contemporary art, with major works from the Gallery’s collection.
Photography will have a strong showing in this year’s Art Festival, which will include a seductive exhibition oforiginal prints from the Condé Nast archives by over 80 photographers at the outset of their careers who went on to become the biggest names in the history of fashion photography. The show, at the City Art Centre, will present early work by key figures including Helmut Newton, David Bailey, Corinne Day and Mario Testino. The show will be accompanied by an exhibition exploring how fashion and costume has been captured in art from the 17th century to the present day, drawn from the City Art Centre’s collection. At the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, the first major museum retrospective of photographic portraits by Man Ray will open charting the influential artist’s career in America and Paris between 1916 and 1968.
Dovecot Studio’s leading exhibition this summer will document the production of Victoria Crowe’s celebrated painting Large Tree Group (1975) into a large tapestry whilst Artist Rugs, also at Dovecot will showcase the studio’s contemporary designed hand-tufted rugs, created in collaboration with artists including Ruth Ewan, Alasdair Gray and John Byrne.
Edinburgh College of Art will present Paul Rooney and artist collective Leeds United for a project in which the two will scrutinise, mythologise and fictionalise each other’s practice. Further exhibitions will include ‘Collector’s Choice’ at Royal Scottish Academy, which will investigate the collecting of contemporary art featuring a wide range of international collectors; and a group show at Bourne Fine Art of 10 paintings by leading Scottish painters, exploring the competing romanticism, rationalism and realism of Scottishness in art over two centuries, from 1750 to 1970. An exhibition of works by Alberto Morrocco at Open Eye Gallery, spanning the artist’s entire career, will feature early student drawings and sculptures through to later paintings and graphics.
EAF is proud to showcase some of the most innovative mid and early career artists at the city’s most interesting permanent, temporary and pop-up contemporary art venues. Glasgow- based Rachel Maclean uses hyper-saturated pop colours to examine Scotland’s romantic histories through the lens of contemporary political debate and will display a new film and digital screen prints for her solo exhibition at Edinburgh Printmakers. A 1.3 ton stone library will rest at the heart of Glasgow-based Ilana Halperin’s exhibition at the National Museum of Scotland, featuring ‘books’ of the mineral mica; and Ângela Ferreira will present a new commissioned work for Stills, alongside her renowned project Political Cameras (For Mozambique Series), 2011. Collective will present a group show including Rachel Adams, Jacob Dahlgren, Nilbar Güreş and winner of the Silver Lion at the 2011 Venice Biennale Haroon Mirza at Meadowbank Sports Centre, the main athletics venue for the 1970 and 1986 Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh.
Old Ambulance Depot will present an immersive installation of new work by Bobby Niven, whilst LOVELY SKY at Rhubaba will see artist Lucy Pawlak adopt the role of producer for a narrative feature film, working in collaboration with a writing team of ‘imagineers’ and advisors drawn from gallery visitors and invited experts. Continuum will create an immersive, visceral experience featuring work by visual artist Catherine Street, poet JL Williams and composer- improvisers Martin Parker and Owen Green; and Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop will present new performances and curated projects by three young artists: Andrew Gannon, Kate Owens and Alex Hetherington. Travelling Gallery, a mobile gallery of contemporary art, will present a group show of alternative views of Scottish landscape, bringing contemporary art to new audiences and communities.
International artists Kjersti Sletteland and Despina Nissiriou, will work with the secrets of the Patriothall building, which is now WASPS artist-run studios and a new EAF venue in 2013, to create site specific work that reflects both the building’s structure and history, and which was once a co-operative bakery. Further new venues in 2013 will include Doubtfire Gallery which will present new work created over a two year period by The Vodnjan Collective, a group of 8 Scottish artists including Alexander Hamilton, responding to time spent in Vodnjan, Croatia.
Further exhibitions will include James Lumsden at Scottish Arts Club; and Paul Reid at The Scottish Gallery. GARAGE, an artist-run space that has been operating since 2006 and comprises three garages and a garden in Edinburgh’s New Town, will present new, site- specific and collaborative work for the Art Festival, selected by artists and developed during a series of small-scale micro-residencies.
Photo: Katri Walker, An Equilibrium Not of this World, film still, © 2012
Edinburgh Art Festival runs from 1 August to 1 September. A full list of artists and further details on all the Art Festival commissions will be announced in May 2013.