SSA|VAS OPEN – Collaborative Exhibition

I visited Edinburgh and saw the SAA|VAS OPEN exhibition at the Royal Scottish Academy with a friend. The SSA|VAS OPEN exhibition runs from the 22nd of December 2019 to the 30th of January 2020. It is a collaborative exhibition between the Society of Scottish Artists and Visual Arts Scotland.

Detail from An Island in Time – Glacier Island, Alastair Clark

I’m going to share a number of images I took while in the exhibition. Although I bought a brochure, I am not able to pair up every photograph of artwork with the artist or details of the medium at present. I try my best, going off my photographs and the brochure; not every piece appears within catalogue as a picture.

Inside the The SSA|VAS OPEN 2019 catalogue

The A3 glossy catalogue is 27 pages long and cost £2. The catalogue has a nice layout, but of course it is too small to show all artist’s work visually, and in detail.

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Table display of various artist books

An artist book that incorporates printmaking

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Gallery space. In the foreground: Mermaid by Sam Shendi

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Part of an installation, Yellow Broom (Clare Waddle & Dave Robson)

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There is an exchange project between the Engramme Studios in Quebec, Canada, and SSA, Scotland. There was a whole room dedicated to the Engramme exchange artwork. I very much liked the mural.

Mural featuring screen prints by Ilana Pichon

Detail from mural

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Left: Steep Decline, right: Climate Precipice, Rowan Paron

These pieces are acrylic and print collage on linen.

Climate Precipice detail, Rowan Paron

Climate Precipice detail, Rowan Paron

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Jeff Zimmer, The Light does not know what to do with me, and This spectacular darkness

A couple of kilnformed black glass artworks. I liked the playful nature of these pieces.

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Concrete Multitude by William Braithwaite

I like this one a lot. Why didn’t I take a picture of the description sticker???

Detail of Manobo Tree, oil on canvas painting by Joseph Buhat

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Right, Edinburgh Interior, oil on hardboard, Wilhelmina Barns-Graham (1937) left, Barns-Graham working on Edinburgh Interior in her studio in Alva Street, photograph, unknown photographer (November 1937)

Detail from Edinburgh Interior

In one room, there was a place reserved to promote the Wilhelmina Barns-Graham Trust. As a student, the artist Wilhelmina Barns-Graham benefited from a number of bursaries and scholarships. The Wilhelmina Barns-Graham Trust supports recent gradates with a cash prize.

As the booklet I picked up states:

Scottish and St Ives based artist Wilhelmina Barns-graham, CBE (1912-2004), established the Trust in 1987. Through exhibitions and publications, it aims to promote and broaden the understanding and reputation of her work as one of Britain’s most significant 20th-century artists. The trust actively supports individuals to fulfil their potential in the visual arts by providing financial support in education funding artists’ residencies.

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Video and booklet, Big Hits (Wars and Songs Commencing from the Year I was born), Alessandro Di Massimo

There were a few videos dotted around the gallery space, and an entire room dedicated to video artwork.

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In the foreground, Pathways by Doug Mackie (Pulled glass on charred wooden plinths)

Alastair Clark, An Island in Time – Glacier Island, digital collage

Detail of mixed-media lichen…

There were so many pieces that these photographs show only a very small portion of the works on display. Still, I want to add more pictures to this post at a later date. When I find I have the time, I’d like to comb through the pieces shared here that are missing information and amend this post.

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Picked up a postcard, and a couple of unrelated things from the gift shop!

After seeing this exiting exhibition, I felt totally pumped to make artwork myself, but I’ve little time to do more than doodle right now… (That is still better than nothing!)

I hope this entry may encourage readers who have not visited an art show in some time to check out accessible galleries to visit in the near future! After viewing fresh artworks, you may find yourself inspired to create and learn more. You may even find a new favourite artist!