Masters by Research, Art & Design: Valuing Women: A Few Days in Scotland

I started with the Glasgow School of Art tour (4th time!). It's different every time. The first couple of times was before it burned down, so was inside the GSA school. The 3rd time, it had just burned down (2015?) and the tour was mostly outside, around the local area. And this time it was entirely inside the new design building opposite, but had a lot of scale models, which actually demonstrated some principles that Rennie Mackintosh used.

The scale model showed how the design was asymmetrical - four equal windows on each storey of the east wing, and on the west wing, two large windows and two small windows on each storey. You could see the clear influence of Scottish castles with the tubular turrets, and the influence of baronial crests in the weathervane and ironwork. The style of the time was influenced by classical Greek and Roman architecture, all straight lines and symmetry - and this was what he was reacting against. I'd never realised this point before.

The following day I went to Edinburgh. I went to the Scottish National Gallery and looked at the Joshua Reynolds of The Ladies Waldegrave, 1780. I liked it because it shows 3 women in classical powdered wigs, actually doing something! They are sitting round a table; one is doing tambour lace, and the other two are holding or winding thread on a card, presumably prior to use. What was interesting was the descriptor - it said the 3 women were the daughters of Earl Waldegrave, commissioned by uncle Walpole, painted by Reynolds (ie names 3 men) then mentions Lady Anna Horatia is making tambour lace and her sisters don't even get named!

The website says "Reynolds was particularly skilled at choosing poses and actions which suggested a sitter's character and which also created a strong composition. Here, three sisters, the daughters of the 2nd Earl Waldegrave, are shown collaboratively working on a piece of needlework. The joint activity links the girls together. On the left, the eldest, Lady Charlotte, holds a skein of silk, which the middle sister, Lady Elizabeth, winds onto a card. On the right, the youngest, Lady Anna, works a tambour frame, using a hook to make lace on a taut net.

Sir Joshua Reynolds, The Ladies Waldegrave, 1780 Courtesy of National Galleries Scotland

Then I went to look at Pauline Burbidge and Charlie Poulson Songs for Winter at The City Art Gallery in Edinburgh. Pauline has been quilting all her life - lots of work about brilliant line drawings of hedgerows, interpreted in stitch. Beautifully done, but I've seen it all before. Fantastic interpretation of nature ... but it does not set me alight, other than recognising the accomplished technique. Likewise Charlie Poulson's work is inspired by nature but he does not want people to realise that is the source - his work represents gesture and energy. Once again, I can see the skill and accomplishment, but it does not enthuse me.

Pauline Burbidge quilt - mono prints on fabric

Complete quilt with mono print, rubbings, cyanotypes

More mark making on fabric

Then I went to an Audacious Women event (3rd year running in Scotland - events by/about women). This was a walking tour of Edinburgh. Run by a social enterprise, but tours operated by people who were formerly homeless/had addiction problems. There had been a tour yesterday, which was oversubscribed, so a short notice tour had been put on Eventbrite, which was how I had booked. They expected 7 to turn up, and actually 12 were there. As conversations went on, it became apparent most attenders were not typical tourists, but people with an interest in social welfare. Biffy, a young girl (mid 20s?) ran the walking tour that took us around various sights associated with women. She told us about former publican/witches, Elsie Inglis (nurse in France in WW1), prisons, the cafe where J K Rowling wrote part of Harry Potter, more animal statues (Greyfriars Bobby) than women statues in Edinburgh, the drug recovery centre that she attended as an alternative to prison, and ended up at a social venture cafe, run by/for people recovering from addiction. Biffy was most impressed when I told her how London Underground deals with people who admit an addiction problem (6 months full sick pay, funded treatment at The Priory, integration back into the workplace). Great, great tour.

JK Rowling has tiny hands

Statue of Greyfriars Bobby - there are more statues of animals than women in Edinburgh

JK Rowling is top right, Ian Rankin is bottom right.

Then today I went to Glasgow Women's Library. Great venue with all sorts of women's literature. Exhibition space with textile and ceramic work by a New Zealand artist about her Scottish grandmother who was a social activist. Great work.

Embroidered banners with feminist quotes

Ceramics with various representations of Helen Crawford, feminist activist

More banners

Women on the Shelf wooden block - Esther Quinn.
Lifelong educator, trade union, women's campaigner, funny, feisty and my friend

There were a lot of these wooden blocks. I think it was £100 to commission one with your choice of woman named and described. I thought it was a great idea to identify and sum up known and unknown women.