Every 2 years Glasgow International Art Festival kicks off across Glasgow's city centre from the West End to Dennistoun and Easterhouse and as far south as Mount Florida, with venues popping up both permanent galleries and pop-up spaces alike. Having been to the past 2 festivals I knew I had to take the time to soak up as much of it as I could and so I travelled through from Fife with the boyfriend in tow on the second day of the 2 week long festival. (Festival runs till 7th May)
As we were on foot I knew our best bet would be to concentrate on the city centre first and fit in as many of them as we could. We arrived in Glasgow at about 11.30am and after a quick pit stop at Starbucks for a coffee and snack to start us off we headed down to GoMA on Royal Exchange Square for our first exhibition.
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| Film by Jamie Crewe |
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| Something tactical is coming (2018) by Cécile B. Evans |
In the main hall was a group show consisting of: Joseph Buckley, Jamie Crewe, Jesse Darling, Cécile B. Evans, Lynn Hershman-Leeson, E. Jane, Sam Keogh, Mai-Thu Perrel and John Russel titled Cellular World: Cyborg-Human-Avatar-Horror. The highlights for me being the giant colourful screen of the elephant face and various doodles and the to-scale miniature office with the comical face resting on the chair.
Upstairs in GoMA are three further shows, not all part of GI but nevertheless worth seeing whilst you're here including TASTE! in Gallery 2, Inner City in Gallery 3 and Polygraphs in Gallery 4. Of these I'd definintely say stop by Inner City to see Michael C. McMillen's miniaturised model of an LA Slum - it's pretty cool!
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| Michael C. McMillen |
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| Michael C. McMillen |
From GoMA we headed along to Trongate 103, the official hub for GI and also home to 4 exhibition venues. First we went to Project Ability to see the work Nnenu Kalu - the artist in residence for the space. During the first week of the festival you can see her create the work for the show, diy cellotape sculptures that grow throughout the room, changing the way the viewer interacts and moves with/in the space.
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| Nnenu Kalu, Project Ability |
Next door in the Project Room was the show GIRLZ CLUB featuring work by Charlotte Arnhold, Erica Eyres, Urara Tsuchiya and Ellis Luxembourg. A mix of video, ceramic sculptures and painted crockery, drawing and installation. Here, the painted plates of a life model and a naked man riding a turtle were a firm favourite.
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| GIRLZ CLUB |
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| GIRLZ CLUB |
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| GIRLZ CLUB |
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| GIRLZ CLUB |
Moving through to Glasgow Print Studio to see Ciara Phillip's exhibition of screenprints on grey gradient walls, there was a nice mix of what felt like spontaneous experimentation and more considered imagery.
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| Ciara Phillips |
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| Ciara Phillips |
Downstairs from there was a small selection of new monotypes by John Byrne which, being Nathaniel's grandfather, we couldn't help but snap a couple of photos of before moving next door into Streetlevel Photoworks to see James Pfaff's mixed media exhibition Alex & Me.
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| John Byrne and Nathaniel |
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| James Pfaff |
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| James Pfaff |
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| James Pfaff |
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| James Pfaff |
Next we popped in to Transmission to see iQhiya, a group exhibition by the iQhiya Collective - a group of South Africa-based young black female artists, before heading over to The Modern Institute on Osborne Street for Duggie Fields, a crowd favourite at this year's festival. Super fun, super colourful, and a fantastic use of the gallery space.
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| iQhiya Collective |
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| Duggie Fields |
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| Duggie Fields |
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| Duggie Fields |
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| Duggie Fields |
With the works being shown spanning back to the 1960s, it was amazing to see how relevant they are still in the current contemporary art scene.
Next we headed across the carpark to The Modern Institute on Aird's Lane where we were greeted by a giant head by Nicholas Party.
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| Me and Nicholas Party |
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| Nicholas Party |
Inside were two exhibitions: Sol Lewitt's Black Cubes and Urs Fischer's Maybe, the latter of which might be my favourite from the festival so far. Two lifelike, lifesize african snails slowly moving round the space. To me it was simply a hilarious way to use such a big gallery space.
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| Urs Fischer |
Round the corner was The Briggait which held the work of Nadia Myre and Deniz Uster. One an exploration of old smoking pipes, creating beautifully delicate looking sculptures from pieces of pipe and the other an installation of small models of ruined buildings and pencil drawings inspired by Ron Herron's idea of 'walking cities'.
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| Nadia Myre |
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| Nadia Myre |
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| Nadia Myre, The Briggait |
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| Deniz Uster |
From there we headed to The Old Hairdressers, stopping by The British Heart Foundation to see the selection of paintings by various international artists installed amidst the furniture curated by Simon Buckley and Othmar Farré.
When we arrived at The Old Hairdressers for the show Old Hair, there was a screening of films by Mike Kuchar from the 1990s, which were fantastically bizarre and hilarious to watch. During the festival there are loads of different events on in this venue so it really is luck of the draw to see what you're going to get on whatever day you go. There was also an orchestration called 'The Frolicsome Engines' by Callum Stirling which was utterly brilliant to watch and absolutely genius use of everyday materials to create mechanised sound, but stupidly I didn't take any photos of it so you'll just have to trust me on that one.
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| Film Still, Mike Kuchar |
Now hitting 4pm we headed up to Garnethill to Glasgow School of Art to catch the last few shows before closing time. The Reid building hosts two exhibitions: Susanne Norregärd Nielsen's Pencil to Paper, beautiful geometric and abstract patterns dotted along the corridor leading to Torsten Lauschmann's War of the Corners - an exhibition I had penned as one not to be missed and boy was I not disappointed!
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| Torsten Lauschmann |
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| Torsten Lauschmann |
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| Torsten Lauschmann |
The main room of the exhibition has 4 projections into the 2 opposing corners of the room which feature different animations including scenes of a video game character jumping off of buildings, his body become completely floppy and bending unnaturally as if he has no bones. In the floor of the room are 4 makeshift instruments which spring to life at different times depending on the video projections. One, a crutch cut up into pieces and reattached together is pulled up from a mechanism on the ceiling straightening out before being dropped again and re-fragmenting - the bells attached to the base jingling with the slightest of movements. There is also a metal string that gets hit, a bowl that gets banged by a walking stick, and a drum that rotates side to side to make balls on strings hit it back and front repeatedly. It's one of those exhibitions that you can sit in and watch for ages and not get bored. Really worth seeing during this festival!
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| Roadmaps at CCA |
Last stop of the day was CCA where there was 4 exhibitions happening. Upstairs was the exhibition Roadmaps by Ewan Mitchell, Camara Taylor and Zoé Schreiber, down from there in the Theatre was Intervals by Raydale Dower, a room in pitch blackness that makes you wonder what's going to happen... and then it does. You will absolutely get the fright of your life at this exhibition, go see it... I won't spoil it for you.
Downstairs is Ross Birrell's The Transit of Hermes, a horse-themed exhibition following an expedition from Athens to Kassel, inspired by Tschiffely's Ride, an equestrian journey from Buenos Aires to New York (1925-1928) complete with haybales and a modern day horse carrier.
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Criollo (2017), Ross Birrel
Image credit: John Engstrom |
Next door in the cinema is Susannah Stark's film 'Unnatural Wealth' which explores the strength of the expressive female voice, whilst highlighting the flow of objects, words, and power in the marketplace.
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| Milkshakes at Steak, Cattle & Roll |
And what other way to end a fully packed day of exhibition going than to top it off with a stop at Steak, Cattle & Roll across the street where the portion sizes and the to-die-for milkshakes definitely finished us off.
Glasgow International 2018 runs until 7th May, but check the dates of exhibitions you're eyeing up as not all of them are running the full length of the festival. Happy art seeing!
Love,
Melissa x
