The British Art Show 8 has just arrived in Edinburgh and will open to the public tomorrow 13 February.
It runs until 8 May so you have plenty of time to go and see it – and you may need a little time as it is spread across three venues. The shows are meant to be viewed as standalone exhibitions, but they are also designed to be part of a whole.
The art on show is very diverse, from ceramic sculpture, printmaking and textiles to installations with film, video and sound, and this touring exhibition will showcase what is widely regarded as some of the most exciting modern day talent.
Work by 22 artists is on show at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art where we met Oliver Chanarin who, along with partner Adam Broomberg, has created a large-scale installation called Dodo. This features a World War II bomber propeller spinning a shadow across a massive screen in front of it, showing fragments of the film Catch-22 previously unseen.
Why Catch-22? The plane was discovered by the artists on the coast of the Sea of Cortez where the Hollywood film of Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 was filmed in 1970. There are fragments of another B-52 bomber used in the movie and subsequently buried on the abandoned set also on display.
The film backdrop includes images of the coastline and wildlife at San Carlos showing the location before urban development encroached, and so the re-edited footage shows a pristine landscape which is no longer there.
Linder is best known for her collages; she first came to prominence as part of the Manchester punk scene, and designed collaged artwork for bands such as the Buzzcocks.
For her work in British Art Show 8 she has applied the principles of collage in a different context: Diagrams of Love: Marriage of Eyes (2015) is a circular rug, 2.2 m in diameter and backed in gold lamé, which has been created in collaboration with Dovecot Tapestry Studio, Edinburgh.
The rug’s design, which recalls the swirling, psychedelic patterns of Sixties and Seventies carpets, was inspired by the essay Children of the Mantic Stain, published by the British Surrealist artist Ithell Colquhoun in 1952. The text proposes the artist as a kind of seer, so the ‘mantic’ rug becomes a means of tapping into prophetic insights, like a crystal ball. It has been cut along a spiral line, enabling it to unfold like a giant snake, and once hung in the gallery, it takes on bodily forms. As well as being exhibited in the exhibition, the rug is also at the heart of a new ballet devised by Linder in collaboration with choreographer Kenneth Tindall, fashion designer Christopher Shannon, composer Maxwell Sterling and Northern Ballet.
There will be a special performance of Children of the Mantic Stain (in which the rug acts as the ‘eighth dancer’) at Dovecot Studios on Wednesday 30 March. Lizzie Cowan from Dovecot Studios explains the story behind it in our video here:
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BRITISH ART SHOW 8
13 February – 8 May 2016
Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art (Modern One)
75 Belford Road, Edinburgh EH4 3DR
Admission free
#BAS8
The Edinburgh Reporter also went to see Jesse Wine’s ceramic sculptures hidden in the vegetation at the Temperate Palm House at the Botanics.
At the Talbot Rice there is a wide and diverse exhibition but our favourite has to be the very comfortable chair in front of a ‘screen’ with a moving conveyor belt allowing you to have a different image before you every half minute or so. From the dead pigeons to a variety of other objects this makes you think about the story behind the image.
Ryan Gander is a compulsive collector and his ‘Fieldwork’ could be funny, macabre or banal. Sit back and enjoy.
Curated by Anna Colin and Lydia Yee, British Art Show 8 features the work of 42 artists who have made a significant contribution to art in Britain over the past five years. The result is a wide-ranging exhibition that encompasses performance, film, sculpture, installation, painting and design. Twenty-six of the 42 artists have produced new works for the exhibition, making this the most ambitious British Art Show to date.
Also at the Botanics, Inverleith House will be host to exhibits by Caroline Achaintre, Pablo Bronstein, Nicolas Deshayes, Simon Fujiwara, Martino Gamper, Anthea Hamilton, Charlotte Prodger, James Richards, Patrick Staff, Bedwyr Williams as well as Jesse Wine.
And the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh has some exhibits of its own of course – the beautiful rhododendrons are already in bud. Spring is on the way.
Founding Editor of The Edinburgh Reporter.
Edinburgh-born multimedia journalist and iPhoneographer.
