July 28–August 28, 2022
Keynote lecture: Jeanne van Heeswijk: July 29, 5–6pm, also available to watch on National Galleries of Scotland’s Youtube channel
Scottish National Gallery, Hawthorne Den Lecture Theatre
Nadia Myre in conversation: August 2, 6:30–7:30pm
Edinburgh Printmakers, Castle Mills
Endnote lecture: Hew Locke: August 26, 6–7pm
St Cecilia’s Hall
The Edinburgh Art Festival is pleased to welcome Kim McAleese as its new Director as the city celebrates 75 years of festival history. The 2022 program brings together independent galleries, world-class collections, and places for production as a celebration of the distinctive ecology of the visual arts in Scotland’s capital city. Platform: 2022, the festival’s annual showcase of up-and-coming visual artists working in Scotland, is presented this year along with more than 100 artists from around the world in 7 commissions, 35 partner shows, and the festival as a whole.
The festival’s 18th edition features major exhibitions of artists including: Ishiuchi Miyako, Céline Condorelli, Tracey Emin, Cooking Sections and Sakiya, Ashanti Harris, Studio Lenca, Luke Jerram, Daniel Silver, Alan Davie, Ruth Ewan, Lorna Robertson, Will Maclean, Duncan Shanks, Barbara Rae, John McLean, and Shelagh Wakely.
This year’s Commissions and Associate Artist Programme explores and responds to the canal and the locals in honor of the 200th anniversary of the Union Canal. The phenomena of a soliton wave, which naval engineer John Scott Russell discovered in Scotland’s capital city of Edinburgh in 1834, served as the inspiration for the show’s title.
Residents of Wester Hailes and nearby neighborhoods in the west of the city have organized as the Community Wellbeing Collective (C.W.C. ), who are presenting Watch this Space in Westside Plaza Shopping Center. The group has been working for 9 months to establish a place where everyone can grow together and understand what community wellbeing is and may be. Throughout the festival, the collective presents a schedule of anchor activities, such as seminars, panel discussions, and musical performances.
The C.W.C. was founded by Dutch artist Jeanne van Heeswijk, who is well-known for her protracted socially active and political activity. In collaboration with the National Galleries of Scotland and British Council Scotland, she will offer the festival’s Keynote Lecture in 2022 as a result of her research work in Wester Hailes. The Liverpool, Shanghai, and Venice Biennales, among other shows across the world, have all exhibited van Heeswijk’s artwork.
Ruby Pester and Nadia Rossi, two Glasgow-based artists who collaborate under the name Pester and Rossi, have developed Finding Buoyancy, an installation of vibrant sails hovering above the canalside activity center, further up the canal at Bridge 8 Hub. The artwork is the culmination of several workshops at WHALE Arts in Wester Hailes, where locals responded to the canal’s significance as a natural area in their community. Setting Sail, a festive live concert held aboard a canal boat, marks the commission’s debut and features songs written by locals in collaboration with Rhubaba Choir.
The festival’s 2022 co-commission with Edinburgh Printmakers will debut work by artist Nadia Myre through print, music, and installation work at Lochrin Basin near the city’s center. Myre, an Algonquin of the Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg First Nation, imprints and entangles materials with meaning in her work, bringing to the fore the decolonial impetus inherent in her approach.
In her talk, Tell Me of Your Boats and Your Waters—Where Do They Come From, Where Do They Go?, Myre will explore her practice and the commission. at Edinburgh Printmakers during a unique event.
Emmie McLuskey, an artist, created Channels as part of the festival’s Associate Artist Program. It focuses on concepts of labor and nature along the canal during a two-century period. At several locations along the canal, the festival debuts new works by Hannan Jones, Janice Parker, Maeve Redmond, and Amanda Thomson, along with Background Noise, a variation of a running piece by McLuskey that takes the shape of weekly radio broadcasts.
The modern artist and sculptor Hew Locke, who was born in Edinburgh, will provide the festival’s Endnote Lecture in 2022. The Procession, a Locke Duveen Hall Commission for Tate Britain, debuted in March of this year. In September 2022, his work Gilt will be exhibited as The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Façade Commission. British Council Scotland is a partner in the presentation of the Endnote Lecture.
The Scottish Government, EventScotland, The City of Edinburgh Council, and Creative Scotland all fund the Edinburgh Art Festival.
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