Martin Craig: Social Sculpture

Though eminently housed in a central location, Glasgow’s Gallery of Modern Art has not traditionally been at the centre of cutting-edge art in the city. The gallery’s Learning & Access Curator, Martin Craig (formerly of Market Gallery), is one of the first to admit this. 

“Two years ago GoMA did a group show called You, Me, Something Else, and it was one of the first shows that I actually came and saw and said, wow, it’s really good. It had James McLardy in – people that we were working with at Market Gallery – and I hadn’t really seen GoMA do that before. Now, I know a lot more, but back then my perception of them was the same as anybody else – that because they didn’t really change the shows around that much, they didn’t seem to be that connected.”

Craig’s stint on the Market committee in Dennistoun means that when it comes to engaging diverse audiences, he’s ideally positioned to give GoMA a good kick up the arse. Which is just what he hopes their forthcoming programme will do.

Conceived as a Part Two to You, Me, Something Else, a sculpture show called Every Day will show work by Mick Peter, Hayley Tompkins, Carla Scott Fullerton, Niall MacDonald, Scott Myles and Laura Aldridge. Scott Fullerton is currently working upstairs in GoMA’S studio, creating new work for the show, while Myles is taking the opportunity to rework a piece he’s shown previously. Busily preparing to show in the Scottish Pavilion at this year’s Venice Biennale, Tompkins will show one of her vitrines.

At Craig’s suggestion, 17 other galleries and practitioners around the city will also put on sculpture shows at around the same time, coming together as ‘Objective - a citywide conversation on sculpture.’ Craig downplays his role in coordinating this. “I asked a few places if they already had their programme set – and if not, whether they’d be willing to think about putting on a sculpture show. Or if their programme was already set, and it happened to be a sculpture show, we’d list it. I was literally just linking up with people.”

Key to the discursive element, GoMA has commissioned a map so that visitors to Every Day can then navigate their way to venues they might be less familiar with – perhaps venturing to the GSA M.Res show at South Block, or even out to Platform in Easterhouse.

Over at WASPS in the Briggait, Janine Matheson (of Sierra Metro) has curated a deceptively benign-sounding show of massive geometric soft shapes by Edinburgh artist Alexander J Allan. Allan will salvage ‘inexpensive yet opulent remains’ from the city and use them to recreate physical tensions within the space, forcing viewers to negotiate playful assemblages and drunken misdemeanours.

This is frankly just an hors d’oeuvre for what you’ll encounter at The Duchy, though. Having spent years prioritising his art over his music, Ross Sinclair has finally made his debut solo album at the age of 46 and he’s ready to let it all hang out. I Tried to Give Up Drinking with Guitars Instead of God (on balance – quite sensible-sounding?) is his new album and the name of a show that reflects on each of the songs in a visual, melodic reverie. Some of the concerns the album addresses are being an old parent, the ever-present spectre of alcoholism, falling out of artistic vogue, and worrying that you might only be average after all. The Poetry Club will host a premature greys-inducing launch party.

If you need a stiff drink after that, head to Danny Holcroft and Ragnar Jonasson’s Tender Bar, a makeshift bar with real beverages and people to talk to. Previously – as you might recall – they held it near the old Sculpture Studios, where if you take a wrong turning you can walk for miles before finding a drink. During Objective they’ll be propping up the Briggait every Friday night, with space to unwind and to mull over all that lovely sculpture.

What d’you get when two Scotsmen, a Mexican and a Welsh woman walk into a bar? The collaborative project by Gwenan Davies, John Nicol, Carla Novi and Jon Thomson began as a line from a bad joke and developed through ‘weird email chat.’ For their residency and show at Glasgow Artist Studios, Cough 'em if they can’t take a choke, they’ll expand on this, ignoring rules of narrative structure and storytelling to allow a more absurd, surreal and comic dialogue to take place.

As well as the show itself, GoMA is putting on a series of related talks and discussions. Even in an art scene as sociable as Glasgow’s, it can still feel like there aren’t enough conversations about the art itself. Craig hopes Objective will prompt more of those conversations.