Vitrine

A display at The Edinburgh Central Library as part of the Hispanic Festival 2011.

This exhibition focuses on depictions of Scots oral tradition singer Sheila Stewart. The aim is to consider issues of representation in relation to live performance. The artwork implies the layers of physical, emotional and creative distance that exists between a live subject and the depiction/record.

The display in the vitrine consists of a collection of images, which have variously been drawn from life, videoed in situ, photographed from video and painted from photographs. The source material for the images of Sheila come from two main sources; from visits I’ve made to Sheila where I interviewed her and made drawings of her, and from a YouTube video from 1980 of Sheila singing in the company of Belle Stewart, Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger.

Also on display are books and photographs from books, which suggest parallels between the countercultures of Scots oral tradition, flamenco history and punk.