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Summerhall round-up: February 2022

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Summerhall Programme February 2022

  • Katie Goh, author of The End: Surviving the World Through Imagined Disasters, presents a season of speculative disaster movies alongside other sensational screenings in Summerhall Cinema;
  • Live music from Dry Cleaning, Roddy Woomble and more
  • Exhibitions by David Williams, Iain Patterson, Abigail Simmonds and Radosław Liweń and James Sinfield continue.

Summerhall dives into 2022 with a packed cinema programme featuring a curated season of speculative disaster movies from author Katie Goh, foreign language hits from Screen Horizons as well as modern and cult classics. Alongside this, the Dissection Room returns after a brief hiatus with gigs from Dry Cleaning, Roddy Woomble, the Transatlantic Ensemble’s ever-popular Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours gig and more. Our four outstanding visual arts exhibitions continue through to Sunday 20 March. 

Katie Goh, author of The End: Surviving the World Through Imagined Disasters, presents a selection of speculative disaster movies at Summerhall Cinema from 10-25 February. This includes films such as the critically acclaimed Mad Max: Fury Road, 1972’s post-apocalyptic environmental sci-fi Silent Running, Hayao Miyazaki’s second film Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, Lars von Trier’s extraordinary Melancholia and many more. These films speak to the present moment, but also perhaps the post-apocalyptic ways we might live in the future if we continue down a social, political and ecological road of disaster.

Summerhall Cinema presents both modern and cult classics, including The Safdie Brothers’ Good Time and Oscar award winning Moonlight. In a bloody Valentine’s Day double feature, Joan Crawford goes berserk with an axe in horror classic Strait-Jacket, and “glorious retro fantasy-horror” The Love Witch takes the romantically-inclined down a dark, psychedelic path. Screen Horizons presents a selection of foreign-language films from across the globe including Josep, which was named best animated film in the César awards; Greek expatriate director Costa-Gavras’ Academy Award winning Z; the tender Love Affair(s) / Les Choses qu’on dit, les choses qu’on fait; and Hello World! / Bonjour le monde, which is made with papier-mâché puppets animated in stop motion and hand-crafted sculptures set in beautifully painted backgrounds.

Live in the Dissection Room and back by popular demand, the Transatlantic Ensemble performs Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours; post-punk poets Dry Cleaning play on Friday 18 February supported by electronic trio PVA; Pokey Lafarge performs his latest album crafted during the pandemic; and Roddy Woomble – considered one of Scotland’s finest songwriters, and frontman of much loved Scottish alternative rock band Idlewild – will bless the Dissection Room with his warm baritone voice. Rescheduled from 2021, second generation folk musician Sam Amidon brings a personal approach to his music and performance for his self-titled seventh album. 

Summerhall’s first four exhibitions of 2022 bring warmth and energy to a chilly Edinburgh winter. Abigail Simmonds’ sparkling Space Becomes Time sees the upstairs Meadows Galleries filled with life buoys, corrugated sheeting, table tennis balls and many other carefully chosen objects painstakingly covered in sequins. While in the War Memorial and Sciennes Galleries, James Sinfield and Radosław Liweń’s Remote Control delves into the anthropocene, exploring the many ways in which we as humans impact the environment around us. In the Corner Gallery, Photographer David Williams’ Cedar Tree – Tofuku-ji Zen Temple, Kyoto and flow…(extracts) both from the project series, one taste: (n)ever-changing (2003-2009) reflect on notions of time, space and self within the context of Buddhist temples and wider aspects of Japanese life. In the newly reopened Lab Gallery Iain Patterson’s Balance explores the possibilities of improvisation in abstract painting and drawing. All exhibitions will close on Sunday 20 March. 

Ends.

Vision Mechanics 10 metre tall puppet STORM will walk in Glasgow for COP26, 10 November 2021

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Fresh from her tour of Scotland, STORM comes to Glasgow to share her 
message of the oceans in crisis during COP26

STORM will walk in Govan, greeted by community and arts groups
along the way who will  amplify her message

Created by Edinburgh-based visual theatre company Vision Mechanics, Storm will once again rise from the oceans to walk on land. Returning to Glasgow for the first time since her first steps were taken as part of Celtic Connections 2020, Storm will walk through Govan on Wednesday 10 November 2021, as COP26 – the United Nations Climate Change Conference – takes place across the city.

Developed in celebration of Scotland’s Year of Coasts and Waters 20/21, this free, outdoor theatre spectacle has received funding support from Scotland’s Events and Recovery Fund, established by EventScotland, in conjunction with funding from Scottish Government, as well as support from Creative Scotland’s Open Fund. The Scottish Government is also supporting Storm‘s appearance at COP26 with £15,000.

Storm is a legend come to life, emerging from Scottish seas to tell us that the oceans are in crisis. She has travelled to 10 towns across Scotland since August 2021, sharing her message with  audiences along the way, and will make her final Scottish walk of 2021 in the city she first stepped foot in. Storm asks those she meets, what can be done to alter the course of the climate crisis? She has learned of COP26, and has risen once more to add her powerful voice to the many who are calling for change across Glasgow. 

She is accompanied wherever she travels by a beautiful soundscape. The Storm music score is written by composer and singer Mairi Campbell and Dave Gray. Mairi’s voice is the chorus of the waves, urging us to care for our oceans. Storm’s eyes are the colour of oyster shells, her hair thick strands of kelp, her voice the chorus of the waves. Made from entirely recycled and natural resources Storm is ten metres tall and weighs around 500 kilos.

Symon Macintyre, Vision Mechanics Artistic Director, said:“Storm is returning to Glasgow for COP26. Her message that we need to care for this amazing small blue planet is more vital than ever. In towns and cities across Scotland thousands have come to greet her,  online thousands more. Storm rises in Glasgow to ask us all to make good on our promises to take action. Storm is a warning and a clarion call to ensure the future for our children and grandchildren.”

Culture Minister Jenny Gilruth said:“Storm delivers a powerful environmental message about the sea and how we can all play a part in protecting our coastal waters. Made from recyclable materials, Storm will be an impressive sight as she strides through Govan with the local community arts and music groups supporting her in this compelling interactive event.”

As Storm walks through Glasgow, she will meet and engage with community groups and arts organisations who will share in her message, including Karine Polwart singing alongside Soundhouse Choir and artist-led social enterprise Oi Musica, who will perform their collaborative composition ‘Enough is Enough’. Storm will also witness Govan schools and community artists perform, co-ordinated by Helen Kyle from Stage Scotland. Further detail on Storm’s route, community involvement and who else she will meet on 10 November will be announced in the coming weeks. 

Laura Mackenzie-Stuart, Head of Theatre at Creative Scotland said: “We look forward to Storm’s return to Glasgow as part of COP26. Art and creativity have a key role to play in helping to address the climate emergency and contributing to a more environmentally sustainable Scotland. This important work, while inspired by the rich heritage and diverse culture of Scotland’s coasts and waters, also carries a vital message about the need to take care of our planet for future generations.”

Paul Bush OBE, Director of Events for VisitScotland, said: “We have been delighted to support Storm through Scotland’s Events Recovery Fund, established by EventScotland in conjunction with funding from the Scottish Government. This majestic goddess of the sea has inspired communities across Scotland with her message centred on the environmental impact on our oceans. Having taken her first steps alongside the River Clyde in January 2020, her return to Glasgow for an appearance at COP26 is a fitting next stop on her journey.”

Storm is the latest production from Edinburgh-based visual theatre makers Vision Mechanics. Previously they toured the giant puppet Big Man Walking across Scotland, transformed Drummohr House into the world of Oz, and installed Giants in the Forest across the UK. Their work invites people to celebrate and participate in creating memorable and interactive productions on huge scales. Storm is their most ambitious, challenging, and politically resonant project yet. 

To offset the carbon footprint that Storm creates through her travels, Vision Mechanics has created a STORM Grove in the rewilding of the Ancient Caledonian led by Trees for Life. These trees hold our promises to tackle climate change and re-wild Scotland. The trees in this grove will create homes for wildlife and forests for the future. Planting trees and watching them grow into a beautiful forest is a hope of a better future for our children. The grove can be added to over time, and anyone who wishes to donate further trees can do so here: https://treesforlife.org.uk/groves/357869/. 

Thanks to Storm’s Funders:

Scotland’s leading festival of arts and ecology is back this June as UNFIX announces 2021 lineup

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Tickets on sale now

UNFIX is back next month with a three week virtual lineup of international events combining art, ritual, dance, film, music, debate, and workshops from 11 – 27 June.

The innovative festival investigating ecological crisis and renewal through the lens of social, cultural, political, environmental and personal transformation will return for its sixth edition – this year in a digital format, providing an online and accessible platform for audiences and artists alike. 

UNFIX Festival started in Glasgow in 2015 and now has sister events in New York City, Tokyo and Bologna. For the very first time, all four cities will synchronise their programmes online allowing an international sharing of works all responding to what the human impact and forced human narrative upon the planet and entire natural world means for us right now. 

Though the lockdowns and digital isolation of the past year have been challenging, UNFIX is leaning into the opportunity they present: the 2021 programme will bring together artists from the UK, United States, Italy, Japan, Germany, Mexico and beyond in ways that could never happen in one physical place. The festival will offer an online dreamspace for creating imaginal solidarity between communities across the world as we face the ‘new normal’ and the restarting of the machine after COVID.

The programme will explore the human relationship to the natural world and how it has changed throughout the pandemic, living within the anthropocene, shedding of skin and letting go of his-tory, revival and rebirth. Artists will celebrate our physical environment, find joy after grief, and call audiences to action to stand up to the climate crisis.

Among the first names to be announced – Scottish and UK artists include:

Interdisciplinary artist Clarinda Tse who works with tactility, the body and another-than human lifeforms and objects, invites viewers to explore the daily magic in Bubbling in Thick Time; multidisciplinary psychic worker and artist Bea Xu presents Bloodsport < The Island – a live online action role playing game set at a world-building temple in a post-extractivist solarpunk future; and with a vast body of work inspired by the natural and cultural ecology of Scotland’s wild places, Dougie Strang invites audiences to participate in a daily practice titled Still Find Joy and hosts a special book launch event, Dispatches from the Dark Mountain.

Edinburgh based artist and cultural geographer, Iryna Zamuruieva will convene a pig mourning ceremony for the 100 million pigs that have lost their lives because of the African Swine Fever (ASF) pandemic; and Carrie Fertig, recipient of the UNFIX festival residency at The Barn in Aberdeen presents Plummet – a thousand piece glass icicle installation and sound performance tolling end times to radically alter our impact, waste, and behaviour.

A snapshot of international names featuring include:

Renowned Japanese Butoh dancer and choreographer Atsushi Takenouchi questions the boundaries between our bodies and our environment, performing Skin from his home in Italy;  Chicago’s Degenerate Art Ensemble, known for large-scale dance and theatre projects present their online work The Invitation – a meditation on the human relationship to the natural world, to Animist practices, and our connection to Mother Earth; and Before Bed – an intimate experimental reading collective located in Sydney, Australia founded by interdisciplinary artist, Audrey Newton will host a shared, interconnected, and comfortable reading and listening experience.

The programme will also welcome returning artists last seen at UNFIX in 2019 including:

Transfeminist artist Niya B engages with her own internalised toxicity and the elements of water and air in a ritual of shedding skin and letting go in Ekdysis; VIDIV, a collaboration of Glasgow based sound and performance artists (Desalvo, Aereogramme, Sons & Daughters) reflect on human mortality and social morbidity using electronic harsh noise; and sound artist and musician Ruaridh Law presents A Sea of Cogs –  a series of short films focussing on those who have lost work during the pandemic, the link between work and identity, and hopes for the future.

UNFIX Director,  Paul Michael Henry, said: “How humans organise themselves, and the ways of life we strive for, begin in our imagination.  Capitalism and our treatment of the planet as a resource started out as ideas, and it’s now obvious that they are inadequate and point towards climate change and disaster.  The arts and communal exploration through culture offer vital ways to dream otherwise, and to imagine a different future. UNFIX aims to provide a melting pot for work concerned with ecological crisis, climate change, hyper-capitalism and all the things that might help to address them: love, care, imagination, joy and dissent.”

UNFIX exists to help us feel deeply and viscerally into the biggest issues shaping our lives, and puts it to you that Climate Change and ecological crisis are happening inside your body, RIGHT NOW.

The Festival takes place from 11-27 June. For the full lineup of artists and to buy a festival pass, visit unfixfestival.com. The full programme schedule will be announced later this month.

Supported by Creative Scotland, the Barn and the Centre for Contemporary Arts (CCA). 

Press contact:

Emma Costello emma@storytellingpr.com

Emma Ainley-Walker emmaaw@storytellingpr.com

Notes to editors.

Festival passes are available to purchase on a sliding scale to ensure our events stay as accessible as possible. This is made possible by having different tiers of tickets, and support we receive from grant funding.

We have four tiers of festival passes and encourage you to buy the ticket most representative of your financial situation – this is an honesty based policy so please use your own discretion. As always we, the festival organisers, are working within financial constraints so please pay what you can afford to support our festival, artists and staff members!

Unwaged Festival Pass – Free
I am unemployed and struggle to meet my basic needs

Low Income Festival Pass – £10
I have trouble meeting my basic needs regularly

General Festival Pass – £15
I regularly meet me needs and am somewhat comfortable
Solidarity Festival Pass – £25
I have surplus disposable income and want to pay in forward

High Income Festival Pass – £40
I have excess disposable income and want to pay it forward by contributing to the running of UNFIX Festival

Full Festival Lineup

Alex Popa – Consider This Unhappy Wretch

April Lin – R: Rest

Atsushi Takenouche – SKIN

Audrey Newton and Fiona Davies – Before Bed

Bea Xu – Bloodsport < The Island

Bibo & Brian Keeley – BREATHE

Carmen Berbel Lapaz – “It was the soundest pile of unwantedness that I knew”

Carrie Fertig – Plummet

Caterina Moroni – Bloom & Doom

Clarinda Tse – Bubbling in Thick Time: farmer, shower, consumables, strainer, microcosms, stillness

Crab Bee – Accessing Genii Loci: Personalities of Place

Degenerate Art Ensemble – The Invitation

Dominique Baron-Bonarjee – Listen to the sap and the juice

Dominique Koch – Holobiont Society

Dougie Strang – Still Find Joy

Dark Mountain Project – Dispatches From the Dark Mountain

Eva Jack – Whale Watching

Finn Rabbit-Dove – Gull

Hollie Miller – We the Living

Iryna Zamuruieva – Pig Mourning Ceremony

Jane Pitt – Sloopwild

Luke Jordan – Hermetic Super-Embryology

Maddie Granlund – 30 Minute Dance, Half-disappeared

Marleen Boschen

Niya B – Ekdysis

Ruaridh Law – A Sea of Cogs

Sandrine Deumier – Falling

Sonja Baumel – Microbial Entanglement

Veronica Mota – Karuma / Shadow Work

VIDIV – VIDIV

Yokko UNFIX NYC – 16 artists curated by our partners at UNFIX New York City, running throughout the festival

Yuri Dini UNFIX Bologna – Notes from the Anthropocene

Seisaku & Yuri UNFIX Japan – The Wind in the Labyrinth