By Kate Robertson, Sculpture Placement Group
ALL across Scotland there are shipping containers, sheds and studios packed with forgotten sculptures that a short time before were proudly displayed in the best galleries.
It’s a curious reality of the commercial market that good pieces, by respected artists, can be on show with large price tags attached one week and bubble wrapped in a basement the next.
Putting all the emphasis on what’s new and demanding huge mark-ups creates an exclusivity which suits parts of the market very well. But it doesn’t serve the interests of most art or artists as it keeps sales down.
We need a different approach – one that brings down barriers and promotes a culture of collecting by making art accessible so it can enrich our communities. Sculpture Placement Group (SPG) is piloting a scheme that will help by giving organisations which normally wouldn’t invest in sculpture the chance to adopt artworks that are in long-term storage and may otherwise have no future.
By working with schools, colleges, housing associations, health bodies and others we aim to give artists the chance to bring their work to whole new audiences. This extends its life, gives it new meaning and builds the artists’ legacies without having a negative impact on commissions and sales. Indeed it may do the reverse; raising their profiles and encouraging people to see sculpture as an investment.
Our formal launch will be at an exhibition called Sculpture Showroom taking place during the Glasgow International festival in April, featuring seven artists including Beagles and Ramsay, Rachel Lowther and Nick Evans. A further 50-plus pieces available for adoption will feature in an accompanying catalogue.
It’s an approach that works. SPG’s founders (who include curators Martin Craig and Michelle Emery-Barker and engagement specialist Nicola Godsal) were instrumental in the rehoming of Spirit of Kentigern (affectionately known as The Whale’s Tail). This once-familiar landmark, by Neil Livingston, had been languishing in a field since the pedestrian precinct in Buchanan Street was refurbished but is now restored and reinstated at the City of Glasgow College.
Before that our Art Lending Library project demonstrated the enthusiasm with which people welcome art into their lives when they are given the opportunity.
SPG is about making sculpture part of people’s everyday world, and not like some exotic zoo animal only to be seen on special visits, during set opening hours and before we shuffle off to the gift shop.
A lot of research has gone into the scheme, involving gathering the views of many artists. We’ve been delighted by their generosity and excitement at having a way to get sculpture into the community – just look around when you are next out, there are so many places that would provide superb settings for artwork.
Sculpture has an incomparable capacity to redefine space, giving focus, interest and character. We hope that some adopters will also develop links with the artist. The piece can then become a catalyst for other arts activities and projects.
Scotland has a great deal of artistic talent and it is something we need to support. Its potential can only be fully realised if we promote the idea of collecting, and beyond that of commissioning. That will make it easier not just for established artists, but will hopefully generate opportunities for emerging ones too.
Our art and our artists should be celebrated as widely as possible by getting their work into places where it can be enjoyed. And after all, to borrow an observation by Rachel Lowther, a sculpture is a better place to meet and talk than at a water cooler.
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