Tag: materialise
10th Year of New Makers Awards
Now in its 10th year, the Materialise programme continues to champion the brightest new makers from design-based disciplines graduating across Scottish Art Schools with the added inclusion of Fife College. This ever-evolving initiative is a platform for emerging practices, co-developed with each new cohort to provide meaningful support during that pivotal first year post-graduation.
In past iterations, we’ve hosted symposiums, exhibitions (both in-person and online), critical feedback sessions, business planning workshops, residencies, and so much more. Each maker is also awarded a £250 prize to help them develop their practice further.
Every year, our staff team visits the major Scottish degree shows, where we’re privileged and challenged to select makers whose work aligns with Fife Contemporary’s core values. We’re deeply grateful to the tutors who generously share their insights, helping us identify the most innovative, environmentally aware, and conceptually driven practitioners. We’re particularly drawn to multidisciplinary approaches and work that pushes boundaries in narrative, technique, and materiality.
This year, we’re thrilled to introduce a cohort whose work feels fresh, unexpected, and deeply inspiring. Their practices span a diverse range of materials and techniques, from wild clay and metal crafted to resemble textiles, to jewellery that borrows from embroidery and doily-making traditions. We see ethical ikat weaving, the revival of harvesting and processing of Scottish wool and linen, patterns created by historic Scottish language and furniture crafted from native trees. Together, these makers push creative boundaries, blending tradition with innovation and have achieved so much in a short space of time.
We left each show buzzing with excitement, already imagining where their work will take them next. Below is a taster of their incredible talent—so please browse, follow, and stay tuned. We can’t wait to collaborate with them over the coming year and see how their practices evolve!
Jewellery and Silversmithing
Elanor Lou Scott
Instagram: @eleanor.lou.scott
Namreem Kanwal
Instagram: @namreemkanwal
Lani Ward
Instagram: @laniward.jewellery
Olga Yatskova
Instagram: @soutache_by_olga
Textiles
Nell Burgess
Instagram: @nellspracticing
Lizzie Forbes
Instagram: @lizzieforbesknitwear
Honey Hughes
Instagram: @artanddesign_byhoney
Catriona Mclean
Instagram: @catrionamdesign
Ceramics
Evan Daggert
Instagram: @aardglen
Furniture
Callum Murray
Fife Contemporary Selects New Makers Awards 2024
It is degree show season, one of our favourite times of the year! Now in its 8th year the Materialise programme champions new makers from design based disciplines graduating from Scottish Art Schools. Materialise, which provides a platform for new and emerging practices, is an ever evolving programme of activity and support that is co developed by each new cohort and seeks to enhance their year post graduation. In past iterations we have held symposiums, in person and online exhibitions, critical feedback sessions, business planning, residencies and much more! Each makers is also awarded a prize of £250 to put towards the development of their practice.
We visit all the major Scottish degrees shows and our staff team have the privilege but difficult task of selecting the makers that align with Fife Contemporary’s core values, tutors are also incredibly helpful at giving us insights into the students work. We look to share and encourage activity that is multidisciplinary in approach and outcome and are interested in innovative, environmentally aware and conceptual work.
This year we are thrilled to introduce makers that have been inspired to create their work with narratives, techniques and materials that we haven’t encountered before. From bold textile installations to incredibly delicate decomposable structural paper yarn knits to a joyous technique called knit de knit and colourful woven studio waste. The jewellery and silversmith departments gave us lighting inspired by an exchange in Japan, speculative and imagined underwater worlds of jewels, energetic drawings in enamel and wire as well as a maker that merges historic Scottish skills with new technology. We even discovered the most gentle and meticulous, slowly crafted hand raised ceramics, we left each show excited to see where their work will take them.
Below is a taster of their incredible work so please browse and follow them. We cant wait to work with them over the next year to see how it all evolves.
Anna Rooney
Website, Instagram: @annaroooney
Leah Faulks
Website, Instagram: @faulks.metal
Erin MacLeod
Website, Instagram: @erinmacleodtextiles
Holly Munro
Website, Instagram: @hollymunro_design
Katie Monteith
Website, Instagram: @katiemonteith_textiles
Kyle Ferguson
Website, Instagram: @dormante_jewel
Imogen Hales
Roisin Spence
Website, Instagram: @roisin_spence_pdf
Rianne van Ladesteijn
Instagram: @rianne_does_ceramics
Fife Contemporary Selects for New Makers Awards 2020
Since 2017 Fife Contemporary has supported and encouraged new makers by hosting online exhibitions under the title Materialise, which has provided a platform for new and emerging practices. We have also awarded a yearly residency to support the development of new work and hosted relevant professional development events.
This year we have had to re-think how we develop a meaningful package of support; we have paused the residency and in its place have decided to invite a cohort of makers that will benefit from tailored development sessions to help support the next phase in their practice, and an online exhibition launching next year.
We have selected the graduates from online degree shows visited by a panel of Fife Contemporary staff and Board members who shortlisted, and with the help of their tutors, selected the makers to invite for this opportunity. An outstanding student from each Scottish art school has been chosen to receive a monetary award of £250 to pay for equipment or materials to help them progress their practice.
We have selected based on criteria that embodies the types of work Fife Contemporary are interested in engaging with and developing. We look to share and encourage activity that is multidisciplinary in approach and outcome and are exited by innovative, environmentally aware and conceptual work.
It has been an incredibly difficult year for these students to graduate so please join us to congratulate and celebrate the work of the following makers who have each given us a short introduction to their work.
Francesca Rea
“I have designed embroidered textiles for burial-wear with fabric that is 100% decomposable and plant-based, including the dyes. This closed-loop life cycle is a reminder of our place in the environment, one that we must look after for the next generations on our planet.’’
Website, Instagram: @francescathreads
Kelda Young
“My work is inspired by recollected fragmented memories, highlighting abstract shapes from details that often go unnoticed within contrasting environments. My collection brings structure to memories, allowing them to be preserved through materialisation. The fabrication of these pieces creates a place for them in my physical world.”
Website, Instagram: @kelda.jewellery
Emalie Lise Dam Christensen
“My work situates itself in the divide between traditional and innovative knitting practices. Through looking at archives, I explores an approach to textiles based on emotional design theory. Strik:t is a process-based enquiry and knitted texture library, where textures can be combined to compose a unique stories.”
Website, Instagram: @emaliedam
Melody Uyanga Ramsay
“I am a fashion researcher and designer whose work explores Postcolonial Theory in relation to the luxury fashion industry – which is grounded in a love of thoughtful design, conceptual innovation and British style. In doing so I invite the us to define our own understanding of aspiration and hope.”
Website, Instagram: @melody.uyanga.ramsay
Michelle Currie
“A collision of the beautifully interconnected realms of Science + Art, my practice results from my exploration of magnetic forces and ferromagnetic materials, creating reactive iron mixtures that are sculpted directly onto magnetic field lines forming curious wearable sculptures that invite cross disciplinary conversations.”
Website, Instagram: @michelle.currie.artjeweller
Anne Morgan
“My work combines cultures of abstract landscape painting and textile design to create heirlooms for the home. Journeys through the Scottish landscape inspire abstract shapes, texture and colour expressed through the slow craft techniques of hand painted textiles, screen printing and embroidery, while reclaimed materials add tactility and depth.”
Website, Instagram: @anne_morgan_designs
Amelia Wang
“Our identity is often moulded by the experiences of our predecessors. My graduate collection embraces different modes of fashion presentation: blurring typical display techniques and bringing memories to the present in tangible, relatable ways. My collection is an exhibition to celebrate these familial memories, sympathetically coalescing the passing of time.”
Website, Instagram: @Ameliawang.design
Vanna Paabor
“I love to explore – challenge mindsets, forms and conventional use of materials. My work is a personal learning experience for my mind and hands. I tend to gravitate towards environmentalism, although justifying making can be difficult, I aim to make conscious choices.”
Website, Instagram: @vannapaabor.creative
Yanan Li
“By pushing the capabilities of paper mache I have found innovative and sustainable ways to work and have developed my own paper mache material. I can adapt my paper mache ‘recipes’ to provide different textural and visual outcomes creating truly unique pieces.”
Instagram: @ttfjewellerydesign
Isabelle Rice
“Human Interaction- So underrated yet vital for survival, loneliness has made people consider the crucial need for touch. My own experience of isolation forced me to feel the impacts of the lack of physical connections also known as skin hunger. The project considers both sides- Human Interaction and the Hunger for Skin.”
Instagram: @belles_conception
Erin Scott
“Artists and designers are constantly connecting with our bodies and with every product we encounter. The lights represent how unaware makers are about our nerves’ contribution during our “making process”. Concealed inside, the data inspired structures are invisible until the lights are switched on illuminating a space with relaxing shadows.”
Instagram: @erinscottdesign
Winners of the School Cash Prizes: Francesca Rea for DJCAD, Melody Ramsay for GSA, Yanan Lee For ECA and Isabelle Rice for Gray’s. Each will receive £250 to help further their practice.
View the online degree shows by following the links below
Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art
We are launching Materialise 3 at the end of this month which will showcase last year’s selected new makers; so keep an eye out to see what they have been up to!
Announcing Our New Sponsored Residency at Cove Park
As part of our New Maker support we are delighted to announce that we will be supporting an artist to participate in a residency at Cove Park in March of this year. Cove Park creates residencies in all the art forms for national and international artists, collaborative groups and organisations. It is located on 50 acres of unspoilt hillside overlooking Loch Long on Scotland’s west coast.
Image Credit -Cove Park Website
This is part of our programming aimed at new makers and was launched in 2017. Identifying a need to support makers at the beginning of their careers, whether it be starting up their business after further or higher education or self-taught entrepreneurs, it’s definitely an area within craft and design practice that will have consistent growth.
Our New Makers’ support started with a pilot online exhibition in 2017 (Materialise) which featured 9 outstanding makers that were selected from degree shows throughout Scotland. The exhibition can still be viewed here. We also held a successful New Makers’ CPD session, Opportunities to Connect, which introduced makers to arts organisations that offer support at this stage in their career such as Applied Arts Scotland, Craft Scotland, Creative Scotland and many more. These introductions were recorded and will be available on our website soon. Look out for an extremely inspiring key note from Kirsty Thomas of Tom Pigeon. In addition, sessions were run throughout the day to give the participants time to interact with each other, build networks and informally ask these organisations what they really wanted to know.
This year we are currently working on the next online exhibition which will be ready early spring this year. We are working with web design agency Pooka to create an engaging and exciting new platform to showcase the work of a group of specially selected makers that graduated in 2018.
From this cohort of artists, a panel of staff and board members at Fife Contemporary selected a maker to award the Cove Park residency to Caitlin Hegney, a graduate from Glasgow School of Art. She will use the opportunity to focus on and research a new body of work. On return from her residency Caitlin will share her experience and progress which we will then share with our audiences. All makers nominated were of an extremely high standard and we can’t wait to share all of their work very soon via the next online exhibition and through our social media; so keep your eyes peeled!
Now that we are into our second year of New Makers’ support we are looking at developing ways to reach and include opportunities to a wider scope of new makers, such as college graduates, self-taught artists, and artists returning to their practice after a break. We would like to include them in future online exhibitions and residencies.
If you know or are a new maker or have come to your practice from an alternative route we would love to hear how and what kind of support you would be interested in. Please email me with any suggestions at stefanie.cheong@fcac.co.uk
Ruth Gilmour Graduate Maker
This week on the blog we have invited Ruth Gilmour, one of the artists involved in Materialise online makers exhibition 2017 to give an account of her recent career developments since the completion of her Degree in Silversmithing and Jewellery from The Glasgow School of Art in 2017.
Working towards the completion of my degree drained much of my energy reserves, and following the graduate showcases at both Glasgow School of Art and New Designers in London, I contemplated a hiatus from researching and making. Grateful for the subsequent invitations to show my graduate collection at Northlands Creative in Caithness, and as part of Claire Norcross’s selection for Great Northern Contemporary Craft Graduates, I organised my projects then hastily travelled to sunshine and fresh produce in the Portuguese countryside, to reflect over pots of jam.
Degree Show Body of Work
My abundant researching of the worlds phenomena, our concerning ecologies and my personal experiences with finitude, all intertwined and established a deep inner tension that perhaps energised an interesting and well received body of work, but left me feeling extremely apprehensive. I found showing this body of work to be incredibly onerous, as I struggled to present the assertion and confidence that can help viewers experience artwork. Your audience want the best for you, they want to believe in all the exciting opportunities that lie ahead following your graduation. And yet, despite the validity of such, it can all appear hazed through fatigue, and through the insecurities and vulnerabilities that are naturally inclined to surface when planning and carving space for yourself in a daunting industry.
When Jospehine Winther, Head of Accessories Design at Kolding Design School, invited me to Denmark for a three month residency in her jewellery department, I admittedly took a little persuasion. This opportunity would call for an early farewell to the warm and fruitful Portuguese countryside, and my return to another gruelling Scandinavian winter surrounded by a landscape that facilitates deep contemplation. Ecological considerations continued to feed into new sculptural and wearable work, motivated by kind invitations to contribute to an art and ecology publication, and a group showcase curated by Gregory Parsons at Ruthin Craft Centre.
2017 project “Loose”
The Design School offered a six month extension to continue my work, and I feel incredibly fortunate to be writing this just as Spring is approaching us here in Denmark. With the ongoing support of Josephine and her department, I am refining porcelain processes, extending considerations and developing skills to offer supervision and technical support to students. Connecting with the many established makers and researchers that contribute to the department’s program continuously provides me with meaningful and insightful experiences. I find myself softening towards my art practice, loosening my concerns towards seeking, or furthermore claiming, something definitive, and instead I am finally finding comfort and joy in the enigmatic making of art
Work In Progress shot from 2018
“Whether you succeed or not is irrelevant – there is no such thing. Making your unknown known is the important thing – and keeping the unknown always beyond you.” Georgia O’Keeffe
Head over to Materialise to view and explore more of Ruth’s work here. Materialise was our first in a series of Graduate and New Maker Support planned for 2017/2018 exploring ways to encourage and nurture new talent in Scotland. Our next event will take place on Thursday 26th April at Adam Smiths Theatre Kirkcaldy where we will be hosting a professional development day, Opportunities to Connect. There will be inspirational talks, breakout sessions and a pop up exhibition of the makers featured in Materialise along with a visit to our most recent exhibition Nexus which showcases the work of 20 makers. To find out more about this go here.
Life After Art School
Guest Blog by Scott Crawford
This is our pilot year of graduate and new maker support. Currently live on our virtual programme is our 2017 Scottish graduate exhibition, Materialise. View the exhibition here. We invited one of the exhibition participants, Scott Crawford, a graduate form Gray’s School of Art in Aberdeen, to give us his honest perspective on ‘Life after Art School’.
Scott Crawford image used as cover image for Materialise
Starting Out and Life After Education
“Much is made of the educational experience which often comes before a career in the creative industries; however I now find myself at the exit point of this stage in my life. Throughout my time at university, conversations surrounding the often dreaded question ‘What are you going to do when you leave university?’ were frequent, but I now realise that until you experience it for yourself only then do you understand advice passed on to you previously.
Vase by Scott Crawford
Having graduated 6 months ago, my experiences have taught me a lot already despite not actually making any new work so far. Having just moved into my first ever studio space in Glasgow this week, this should be happening very soon – but I have quickly learned that simply being as proactive as possible and presenting yourself to the design world is the best way to get ahead. Personally, I have exhibited at New Designers’ exhibition in London, and also as a result of that been shortlisted for the MADE.com Emerging Talent Award where I was invited as a guest to a number of London Design Festival events recently. I would say that any publicity is good publicity and anyone looking to establish themselves should apply for as many awards, grants, open calls and exhibitions as possible, as each relatively well known one I have been part of has led to at least some contact regarding collaborations or possible another exhibition as a result.
Vessel by Scott Crawford
Giving specific advice to those looking to start a career in the creative industry can be difficult as each and every case is so unique and different, but in general hard work really does pay off. However, I do feel the one piece of general advice I would follow is to unapologetically express yourself in your work. In my earlier years I had tried adopting different styles in my work, but in the previous 12 months I have made a concentrated effort to really understand what my personal brand is, and this has probably been the main reason for my recent work being the most satisfying collection of objects I have produced thus far. For anyone in the same position as myself, or soon to be here, keep working confidently and putting work out there. Opportunities are always available, but at the beginning finding them yourself is crucial.”
View more of Scott’s work in the exhibition here and on his website at www.scttcrawford.com
Coming up soon…
… a re-scheduled version of Opportunities to Connect, a professional development day for new makers and recent graduates. Bookings will be taken early in 2018.