Edinburgh Art Festival: 2017 Commissions Programme

Once again, Edinburgh Art Festival will invade the capital’s galleries, museums and artist-run spaces for another vast and mostly free festival of contemporary visual art. Today the Commissions Programme, EAF’s annual programme of new artworks engaging with the unique context of Edinburgh in August, have been revealed. Titled The Making of the Future Now, the eight new projects invite artists to take inspiration from two important Edinburgh anniversaries this year.

The first is the 70th anniversary of the festival itself, which launched in 1947 along with a network of other arts festivals across Europe, including Venice Biennale and Documenta, with the ambition to “provide a platform for the flowering of the human spirit” after the horrors of the Second World War. In that time of division and pain, art was seen as critical in fostering dialogue across nations.

A generation earlier, town planner, conservationist, social activist and polymath Patrick Geddes was also trying to think of a way of bringing society together: and art was his answer too. During the height of the First World War, Geddes became acutely aware that out of the destruction of that war could come an opportunity to build new and better ways of living. In his manifesto The Making of the Future, Geddes imagined a society driven not by “a machine and money economy”, but “a life economy”. He felt art and culture were central to building a better world.

Thirty years later, the Edinburgh Festival took inspiration from Geddes’ words, and a century later, Edinburgh Art Festival’s Commissions Programme will, according to today’s announcement, “pay homage to the physical and intellectual legacies of Geddes and the festival in the city, and makes a claim for the continued relevance of their core values and ideas today.”

The Making of the Future Now takes the form of eight new projects by Scottish and international artists at sites in and around Edinburgh’s Old Town. Here are the highlights:

New site-specific garden studio

Edinburgh-based artist Bobby Niven will create a site-specific garden studio in Johnston Terrace Wildlife Garden – the urban wildlife reserve was originally founded as a community garden by Geddes at the end of the 19th century. “A social sculpture, this new structure will host artists in residence during EAF as well as act as a venue for environmentally focused-workshops, inspired by Geddes’ thinking,” notes EAF.

A giant dragon 

Trinity Apse, just off the Royal Mile, will see a giant dragon sculpture installed by Walker & Bromwich inside the spectacular gothic kirk. In addition to this artwork, there’ll be a series of rituals and a public pageant performed. EAF say: "Playful and utopian, the work invites audiences to consider alternatives to the dominant capitalist model."

Shannon Te Ao’s new multi-channel video

New Zealand artist Shannon Te Ao, the recent winner of New Zealand’s Walters Prize, will present a major new multi-channel video work. We’re told the piece will address “the physical and emotional depths of love, grief and healing.”

New Toby Paterson sculpture

Glasgow-based artist Toby Paterson will install his new sculpture in Chessels Court, with the aim of “creating a landscape for reflection”. We’re told that Patrick Geddes had a close association with this Old Town site.

A Summer Meeting: weekend of Geddes events

Running 11-14 Aug, this weekend of events will include a rare opportunity to visit the original home of Geddes, in Ramsay Gardens. Reflecting on Geddes' ideas of city development, housing, and the role of education and the arts, we’re told that “EAF will work with residential communities to co-produce events across the city.”

Platform: 2017 – emerging artist showcase

A quartet of emerging artists, chosen by Graham Fagen and Jacqueline Donachie, will be showcased. The exhibition will be installed at another of EAF’s new venues, a former Victorian Fire Station on Lauriston Place next to the Edinburgh College of Art.