The Skinny on... Morven Mulgrew & Kate Owens

What’s your favourite place to visit?
Morven Mulgrew: Sierra Metro 13-15 Ferry Rd, Edinburgh for coffee, where Kate and I have a show on until 19 June open 10am-2pm most weekdays and weekends. Which is entirely coincidental to the great coffee, obviously.
Kate Owens: I can’t share my favourite place to go because I don’t want anyone else to go there and ruin it.

What’s your favourite food?
Mulgrew: Probably Turkish food from Dalston Kingsland, I'd go Mangal, Stone Cave or Umit 2000. The pomegranate marinated onions...
Owens: Soffles Pitta Chips, made in Tottenham where we both used to live. You only need a few, they’re so substantial and not greasy at all! Rosemary & Thyme are the best flavour.

Favourite colour?
Mulgrew: Blue, because Kate hates the colour blue and I think that's quite harsh to hate a whole colour.
Owens: Green: nature-ally.

Who was your hero growing up?
Mulgrew: Never had a hero, just people I was jealous and embittered by which can be seen as ALSO motivating in a way.
Owens: No heroes as such but I did really want to be a dancer after seeing Cats the musical at the Edinburgh Playhouse.
Mulgrew: I take it back, my hero is Old Deuteronomy, the Judi-Dench-as-a-cat-wearing-a-fur-coat-even-though-cats-already-have-fur version.

Whose work inspires you now?
Owens: I’m genuinely inspired by seeing the work of my peers (from way back on my BA at ECA) develop and mature as we all grow up. Katie Orton, Tessa Lynch, Ruth Ewan, Alberta Whittle, Alexa Hare, Rabiya Choudhry, Craig Coulthard, Jenny Hogarth, Kim Coleman, Katie Paterson and Peter Donaldson etc.
Mulgrew: Kate Owens.
Owens: Obviously Morven Mulgrew too! Her capacity for making stuff happen in a short space of time is inimitable!
Mulgrew: I'm very deadline-motivated.

What three people would you invite to your dinner party and what are you cooking?
Mulgrew: I find inviting people over generally exhausting due to my desperation for everyone to like me haha. So three people I don't need to please. I like making salads that are mostly nuts and cheese and meat and vinegar. Or a smoked sausage supper with chippy sauce.

What’s your all-time favourite album?
Mulgrew: I like to listen to things like Nirvana and Pixies (best of albums) to remind myself of my horrendous teenage years.
Owens: Anything by Django Django!

What’s the worst film you’ve ever seen?
Mulgrew: I like bad films better than good films tbh. I LOVE Magic Mike XXL – is that the worst film I've ever seen? It's feckin brilliant though. So no. I don't like slow meditative takes on the human condition so probably one of them is the worst.
Owens: Django Unchained.

What book would you take to a desert island?
Mulgrew: I need to finish Moby Dick but the thing is it's completely unsuitable reading matter when the weather is good. I'd absolutely hate to be on a desert island. I'm scared of the dark and I hate sand.
Owens: Thinking Through Craft by Glenn Adamson. It’s sort of funny in bits, has pictures and you need somewhere quiet to read it (Wait is Morven going to be on this island too?!?)

What's your all-time favourite artwork?
Mulgrew: I like a big experiential smack-in-the-face populist art like the Olafur Eliasson sun in the Turbine Hall, or Jeremy Deller’s Stonehenge bouncy castle, or this brilliant thing I saw in a church which was death metal played on the organ... I just googled it and it was by Matt Stokes. I like to feel my feelings, not think.
Owens: Vollmond by Pina Bausch. It’s a dance piece that feels a lot to do with the sensory quality of materials including the body.
Mulgrew: I also like dance, there is a great Olafur Eliasson work with dancers set in his artist studio, you can google that too.

Who’s the worst?
Mulgrew: Slightly older men who say "good girl" to me. I'm fucking 40!
Owens: At what? Writing witty responses to questions? Me.

When did you last cry?
Mulgrew: Probably ten minutes ago, I leak easily.
Owens: I don’t know! Now I’m anxious, I know I’ve been very sad about things that have happened in the last few years but I can’t remember crying!!
Mulgrew: I'm wet, she's dry. It works!

What are you most scared of?
Mulgrew: Death, the populist answer.
Owens: Being exposed to any trauma or sharks.

When did you last vomit and why?
Mulgrew: 10 Downing Street, June 2020. No one found out though so it's fine.

Tell us a secret?
Mulgrew: We have a show on in Sierra Metro until 19 June showing curtains and ceramics, and we would love you to go! There are free posters!
Owens: We’re sponsored by Soffles Pitta Chips and Lind & Lime Gin.

Which artist could you take in a fight?
Owens: None, I’ve got poor upper body strength and don’t like confrontation.
Mulgrew: Kate Owens

If you could be reincarnated as an animal, which animal would it be?
Owens: A grey squirrel? They seem to have a relatively easy time of it. I don’t think they’ve got many natural predators in the UK and I like the idea of living in trees and eating nuts.
Mulgrew: A seal (rat of the sea), a pigeon (rat of the sky) or a rat (…).
Owens: So basically we’d both be vermin.

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Sierra Metro presents SKU, a collaboratively presented exhibition by Morven Mulgrew and Kate Owens, until 19 Jun, Sierra Metro, 13-15 Ferry Road, Edinburgh