When people ask me what I do, I usually answer, “I’m a student at Edinburgh University,” and their faces light up.“I love Edinburgh…have you been to the castle?”
“Yes of course,” which is true, I know it pretty well.
“And what do you study?”
“History of Art.”
“How interesting, what are you going to do with that…teach?”
“Not if I can help it,” I reply and I can see to most well wishers this may seem arrogant, maybe even naïve.
“But what else can you do?” They ask and their eyes narrow to scan my face for any trace of genius that might spurt forth. Disbelief battles it out with intrigue for a few moments but the longer I stay mute, the more self conscious I begin to feel that they’re staring at my nose and the topic of conversation is soon changed.
I have been through this routine several times by now, and approaching my final year as an undergraduate art student, I’m beginning to panic about the practical use of my degree too.
The truth is, I may well end up as a primary school teacher earning my wage 9 to 5 Monday to Friday but that’s not a very interesting story and I doubt anyone (including me) wants to hear about it. So I thought I’d dwell on the good stuff whilst I can and I thought I’d do it right here in cyber space.
Indeed, whilst working in a backend coffee shop this summer, for just under £6.00 an hour, I got to thinking. Yes, Glasgow is a miserable dump of a city when it’s dark and rainy-and summer 2009 was hardly a scorcher I can assure you- but it is also a place famously bound by good will and generosity with an ever expanding future in the arts and a pretty impressive past:
1826 Royal Scottish Academy founded
1854 Glasgow Art Gallery and Museum founded
1859 National Gallery of Scotland founded.
1900 Glasgow School of Art Opened.
1960 Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art founded.
1967 Scottish Arts Council set up.
1990 Glasgow is named European City of Culture.
1996 Douglas Gordon (Glaswegian) wins the Turner Prize.
2001 Martin Creed (Scot) wins the Turner Prize.
In recent years, the art scene has really flourished due to a stream of money into the arts and wider access to art colleges and studying facilities in general. We, the tax paying public, perhaps feel we should have more say over what is shown in our cities. Art is no longer merely the rich man’s play thing….or is it?
Summer 2009 saw a string of interesting exhibitions in Glasgow and Edinburgh alone.
Highlights include Artist Rooms an exhibition at the Scottish National Modern Art Gallery running until November 8th, The Discovery of Spain at the Royal Scottish Academy in Edinburgh until 11th October and the extremely controversial exhibition sh[OUT]: Contemporary Art and Human Rights at the Glasgow Gallery of Modern Art until 1st of November.
I’d like to spend some time exploring the art scene outside of class and reviewing the exhibitions which are put on all over Scotland. Anything is fair play- exhibitions big and small, blockbusters and local stone painters from Arbroath. I simply want to enjoy what’s out there and understand the wealth of creativity in our Scottish population…and forget about the teaching degree for one more year at least!
If you read this and you have any suggestions about where do go next or about what I've written- please comment. I'd love to get some feedback and share your thoughts too.
To begin, I came across a quote recently which interested me and which I think would be a good place to start:
The purpose of art is not a rarified, intellectual distillate- it is life, intensified, brilliant life. Alain Arias-Mission.
