Tilting Axis Collections and
Commissioning Fellowship 2019, Scotland
The Tilting Axis Fellowship is a direct outcome of the Tilting Axis meetings in 2015 at Fresh Milk in Barbados, in 2016 at the Pérez Art Museum Miami and in 2017 at The National Gallery of the Cayman Islands. For its 2019 iteration, Scotland based cultural partners including the Glasgow School of Art, The School of Art History at the University of St Andrews, CCA Glasgow, LUX Scotland, Hospitalfield and curatorial duo Mother Tongue have come together to offer support for a research fellowship to Scotland for an emerging contemporary art practitioner living and working in the Caribbean to share knowledge about current approaches towards commissioning and collecting in the arts.
For Whom?
Curators, researchers, artists, or cultural producers based in the Caribbean region who want to make new links in Scotland and have a keen interest in developing their curatorial practice. Applicants must have a working knowledge of English.
Goals
Develop, stimulate, support, and visualise curatorial and artistic realities coming from the Caribbean region;
Facilitate face-to-face communication in Scotland;
Offer free and open access to knowledge and practices;
Provide a stable platform for professional experiences;
Produce critical knowledge on educational tools as well as visual culture;
Focus on emerging practices;
Utilise the existing Tilting Axis network;
Offer practical support for the duration of the research trip in Scotland.
This Fellowship opportunity focuses on the development of pragmatic and critical curatorial and artistic practice hailing from the Caribbean region, and is research and practice-led, and mentor-based. The fellow will be invited to Scotland for up to one month from 1 October 2019 to undertake a period of open-ended research and development. Artists or curators may apply to undertake research for a mode of curatorial practice. The Fellowship is focused on alternative forms of Collections and Commissioning, in collaboration with partners across Scotland whose work focuses on various forms of collecting, archiving or supporting the development of artworks.
Within the Tilting Axis annual convenings, complexities of mobility, the politics of archiving, access and privilege, decolonisation, institutionalism, curatorial knowledge, pragmatics, and social realities have surfaced as keywords of urgency within Caribbean cultural ecosystems. We seek proposals that engage with the unique visual culture available in the Caribbean and what might be learned from its unexpected and innovative approaches. The Fellowship has an open-ended outcome, offering support for critical development of curatorial or artistic practice while giving a practical base within partner organisations to research different methodologies and institutional approaches.
Drawing on the specifics of the Caribbean region through processes of decolonisation, race, mobility, access and privilege and digitalisation, your proposal might approach actively how people live and work, and especially how contemporary art takes a responsibility to reflect and act on it. What are fears as well as potentials in these current times? Within such a complex geography, what are the challenges? What are the interventions? The Fellowship might support and expand these conversations on a mutual basis.
More information about each organisation’s core interests can be found below. It is expected that the Fellow will focus on a period of research with each organisation to mutually address some of these questions across the month-long residency.
The fellow will receive a fee of £1500 and a per diem to cover expenses and living costs whilst in Scotland. All travel and accommodation costs will be covered by the host partners. An itinerary of travel, meetings and public events will be arranged in collaboration with the successful applicant and partners, prior to the fellow’s arrival. The budget will be managed by the partners, and includes a winter clothing allowances of £300. The Fellow is also expected to participate in a public event or lectures in two or three Scottish locations, to share their knowledge, context and practice.
A contribution to the public blogs of British Council and CCA Glasgow as well as the Tilting Axis website will be required along with a final report on the Fellowship. Tilting Axis partners will work towards funding additional funds for the fellow to attend Tilting Axis 6, (location tbc) where the fellow can present on their experience.
Application
Applicants for the Fellowship are invited to develop an independent proposal outlining a clear interest in the issues and organisations highlighted. The proposal should be content driven and can be based on already existing research or offer new projects. The fellow is not expected to produce an outcome or finished artwork but will be expected to speak publicly about their ongoing research or interests whilst in Scotland.
Departing from a curatorial or artistic ambition, we expect to see a statement of intent of maximum 1000 words. This statement should explain the fellow’s research focus, respond directly to the keywords and thematics raised in the call out, and highlight reasons for visiting Scotland and/or the partner organisations. A separate artist/curatorial statement can also be supplied. Please also include a CV and two references, and an indication of availability from early October 2019. The application should be submitted via e-mail to: Ainslie Roddick, CCA Glasgow Curator: ainslie@cca-glasgow.com.
The deadline for submission is 15 April 2019.
About the partners
The Fellowship is hosted by six Scottish partners, who will host the Fellow in Glasgow, St Andrews and Arbroath. The partners will provide accommodation and wayfinding, and/or access to public platforms and resources. Information on each partners specific provision is below.
The British Council creates international opportunities for the people of the UK and other countries and builds trust between them worldwide. We are a Royal Charter charity, established as the UK’s international organization for educational opportunities and cultural relations.
Glasgow School of Art is one of Europe's leading higher education institutions for education and research in the visual creative disciplines. The Special Collections of the GSA Library number around 7,000 volumes across 16 thematic strands. They include rare and historical material from the 16th-20th centuries, material from the School’s foundation collections, and contemporary artist-produced publications. Particular highlights are 1000 artists’ books, 700 Art Nouveau bindings by Glasgow designer Talwin Morris, a small collection of burnt books salvaged from the School’s 2014 fire, and the design studio library of Glasgow carpet manufacturers James Templeton & Co. Each thematic collection is described in depth at https://lib.gsa.ac.uk/special-collections/, where you can also find links to digitised material that can be viewed online.
The GSA Archives and Collections house documentation and artefacts relating to the school, its students, staff, buildings and activities dating from its opening in 1845 to the present day. The archives contain a large number of items by Charles Rennie Mackintosh, giving us one of the largest Mackintosh collections held in public ownership. We also hold a number of deposited collections from former GSA staff and students which often contain preparatory work such as sketchbooks, drawings and samples as well as finished artworks, notebooks and diaries. Taken together, our collections provide an excellent record of life at the School throughout its history, reflecting changing political, economic and social contexts and the attitudes of staff and students about a wide variety of subjects. More information about the Archives and Collections can be found online at: www.gsa.ac.uk/archives and through our blog http://www.gsaarchives.net/blog/, our Instagram account @gsaarchives, and our twitter account @gsalibrary.
Glasgow School of Art will host a public lecture and give access to the library, special collections, archives and research-active faculty, with orientation given by Tiffany Boyle from Mother Tongue.
The School of Art History at the University of St Andrews is a vibrant centre for research and teaching in the histories of art and Museum and Gallery Studies. Current projects based in the School include EU-LAC Museums, a research network connecting museums in the Caribbean, Latin America and Europe which has involved partnering with the University of the West Indies on the Arrivants exhibition. While at St Andrews, the Tilting Axis Fellow will be able to access the University’s extensive Special Collections, including the Photographic Collection and the holdings of the Museum of the University of St Andrews Collection Centre. The Fellow will be supported in identifying and selecting materials and collections to view in advance of their visit, and will have access to the University Library as well as desk space in the School.
The School of Art History at the University of St Andrews will provide travel to/from and accommodation in St Andrews, hospitality and host a public event in the university.
CCA: Centre for Contemporary Arts is Glasgow’s hub for the arts. It is a large venue with exhibition spaces, a theatre, cinema, café/bar, cultural tenants, residency spaces, artist flat, archive and more. Previously home to The Third Eye Centre (1975-1991), the building is steeped in history and the organisation has played a key role in the cultural life of the city for decades. We operate a unique open source programming policy where we offer organisations and individuals space in the building to programme their own events.For the fellowship, CCA will offer insight into this manner of hosting and programming, as well as access to our archive from the Third Eye Centre (1975-1991) and CCA (1992-the present). Other projects of interest might include our publishing activities, Publication Studio Glasgow and our public engagement programme.
CCA will provide administrative and mentoring support for the residency, a certificate of visa sponsorship via the Tier 5 Creative and Sporting route, and access to the CCA apartment between 1 - 23 October 2019.
Mother Tongue is a research-led, independent curatorial practice working locally and internationally, formed in 2009 by Tiffany Boyle and Jessica Carden. They have since then collaboratively produced exhibitions, film programmes, discursive events, essays and publications, working with galleries, museums, archives, and festivals.
Mother Tongue will support access to their Art Fund collaborative project with Glasgow Museums, and the newly-acquisitioned works this has brought into the GM collections. These works are stored at the Glasgow Museums Resource Centre - a purposefully-built storage facility, with collections ranging from Art and Painting, Arms and Armour, Natural History, Technology and World Cultures, and with 17 specially-designed and environmentally controlled storage ‘pods’ housing around 1.4 million objects. Access to the GMRC and an introduction to its collections and corresponding programming can be facilitated if desired by the fellow.
LUX Scotland is a non-profit agency dedicated to supporting, developing and promoting artists’ moving image practices in Scotland. Our core activities include public exhibition and touring projects, learning and professional development for artists and arts professionals, distribution, commissioning and production support, research and sector advocacy. Established in 2014 as part of LUX, LUX Scotland is based in Glasgow and is supported by Creative Scotland.
The Tilting Axis fellow will have the opportunity to work with LUX Scotland to devise a screening programme in the Caribbean drawing on their research into the LUX collection, the largest distribution collection of artists’ moving image in Europe comprising over 4,800 works by 1,200 artists from the 1930s to the present day. LUX Scotland will facilitate research access to the collection, provide mentoring and logistical support, and cover programming costs.
Hospitalfield is dedicated to contemporary art and ideas. Hospitalfield is a place to work, study, visit and enjoy. Our contemporary arts programme is anchored in the visual arts yet encourages interdisciplinarity. We maintain strong national and international working partnerships with the aim of making Hospitalfield a meeting place and cultural catalyst in the working lives of artists and creative professionals in Scotland and far beyond. Through our carefully structured residency and summer school programmes we support the production of new work and provide space for debate and learning. We programme a large summer festival and two seasonal open weekends each year where we commission new work for our growing audiences. We also run a busy study centre facility which hosts events and residential groups. Attracting others to use our facilities inspires excellent working partnerships that are highly complementary to our core public programmes.
The fellow is invited to spend a long weekend at Hospitalfield House in Arbroath for a period of respite and reflection. Hospitalfield will provide accomodation and meals during the fellow’s stay.
About the Tilting Axis
Caribbean organisational cohort:
Tilting Axis is a roving meeting, pivoting on a Caribbean axis from which all other coordinates are viewed, understood and measured, facilitating more and more alliances. It was co-founded in 2014 by Annalee Davis of The Fresh Milk Art Platform and Holly Bynoe of ARC Magazine/The National Art Gallery of The Bahamas. From its inception, Tilting Axis has grounded its concerns in the Caribbean as a part of a wider creative ecology, and the health, evolution and advancement is a primary objective of its annual meetings held both inside and outside of the region. As a part of its expanded team, the core now also includes Dr Mario Caro, Former President of Res Artis; Tobias Ostrander, Chief Curator at the Pérez Art Museum Miami; Natalie Urquhart, Director of The National Gallery of the Cayman Islands; and Lise Ragbir, Director of Galleries of Black Studies, University of Texas, Austin, USA.
Summary
Aimed at curators, researchers, artists, or cultural producers focused on, or with a clear interest in, curatorial practice from the Caribbean region, developing collections and commissioning.
Fellowship period: From 1 October 2019 for approximately 1 month, end date to be negotiated depending on proposal and personal/professional situations.
The core partners will be available as mentors prior to the visit, depending on the fellow’s needs and wishes. Throughout the year these mentors are accessible online or on location.
In their application, the fellow should articulate their interest in visiting Scotland and/or connecting with the partner organisations, and respond to the core concerns of the Tilting Axis Network.
All travel, expenses and accommodation costs for the month will be covered by the partners, with a daily per diem provided. A separate fee of £1500 for the fellow is also provided.
CCA’s artist flat in Glasgow is available from 1 – 23 October. The University of St. Andrews will also provide accommodation from during the Fellow’s visit to St Andrews. Hospitalfield will provide a long weekend of accomodation. Travels costs are supported between partner cities. Any other travel throughout Scotland should be covered by the fellow.
The Fellow will be selected on the basis of a project proposal and a succinct motivation elaborating the candidate’s interest in developing a Caribbean curatorial or artistic/research-based practice. The deadline for submission will be 15 April 2019.
The proposals will be judged by a jury consisting of core Fellowships partners, after which shortlisted candidates will be invited for an interview via Skype.
The Curatorial Fellow will be appointed by 10 May 2019.
Jurors will be:
Tiffany Boyle and Jessica Carden, Mother Tongue, UK
Holly Bynoe, ARC Inc + The National Art Gallery of The Bahamas, Tilting Axis co-founder
Annalee Davis, Fresh Milk Barbados, Tilting Axis co-founder
Ainslie Roddick, CCA Glasgow, UK
Nicole Yip, LUX Scotland, UK
Catherine Spencer, University of St Andrews, UK
Ken Neil, Deputy Director (Academic), Glasgow School of Art
In partnership with and supported by the British Council, CCA Glasgow, Glasgow School of Art, LUX Scotland, Hospitalfield, Mother Tongue, The University of St. Andrews and Tilting Axis.