Scottish Culture

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Scottish Culture final piece

Final Piece:

So for my final piece, i decided to use Glasgows motto "People Make Glasgow" as its a very detersive motto as it never states what group of people its aimed at but as its mostly used to create tourism in Glasgow, its gonna be allocated to the better off, ambitious and well kept people when in reality, that isn't the case. I tried to be as loyal to the brief as possible while giving my own interpretation on Scottish Culture. I originally thought about all the things i consider in Scottish Culture such as the stereotypical things like famous landmarks, cities, food, clothing ect but i didn’t 100% feel happy with going that path, so i tried to look at the phrase “Scottish Culture” in a new perspective and show that as much as everything in our culture is very beautiful and diverse, theres alot of poverty and struggle under the mask that the rest of the world don’t see when they first think of our country.

Overall i think my piece does succeed but i feel like i could have done more in terms of showing in more detail and depth in my piece.

[scottishculturedc]

The Glasgow "Ned"

When people think of the East End of "Deprived areas", "Ned" (Non Educated Delinquent) is always one of the few named groups of people associated with it so i have created some work reflecting on how East End Architecture can affect a young persons demeanour and personality. 

I stared off with an outline of what i would consider “the stereotypical ned” and worked on using appropriate colour and images to reflect my original idea stated above. 

I played around and tried different visuals such as putting alot of images in the piece to make it more noisy and expansive to only putting a few to create more focus of what was happening.

I tried different background colours to see how much focus they would generate to the image and give it a focal point.

Overall, these experiments where fun to do and as much as they aren’t very self explanatory, they do fit into my interpretation and a big  part of what i consider Scottish Culture to be.

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"Top Reasons to Visit Glasgow"

"Top Reasons to Visit Glasgow"

I found a blog which gives reasons to visit Glasgow and i found it interesting on how they only mention the good things and mostly the west end but never mention the east end areas, so i created a piece based around that blog

https://peoplemakeglasgow.com/visiting/top-reasons-to-visit-glasgow

The reason for my initial idea of this experiment was that i was reading alot of blogs about Scotlands tourism, mostly Glasgows (As its where i live) and from what i saw, the blogs barley any every mentioned the East End or any parts of Glasgow considered “rough” or “rundown”, almost like these places don’t exist when they’re in walking distance from landmarks and more well kept area. It just gives the impression that ignorance is bliss in alot of cases and almost like these areas are considered embarrassments that would be swept under the carpet rather than attempted to be fixed

[scottishculturedc]

Glasgow West End Experiments

Glasgow West End Experiments

So this piece is very in your face and self explanatory in terms of visuals and wording. I tried to create a spray painted flag like cross for the East End experiments as theres alot of vandalism in rundown areas, a big part caused from spray paint. I treid to think to myself “what would Scottish tourism propaganda be like if it was honest and critique to itself”

Again being very blunt was intentional as well as creating something to get people talking and showing that there are people out there who see through tinted glasses at how damaged Scotland is with its poverty and rural areas being embedded in Scottish Culture.

I used colour to express and bring out my ideas with the collages being messy and noisy to catch the eye and severity of how both Collages are the same coin, just different sides.

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Glasgow East End experiments

When i finally decided to go with my interpretation of what i seen Scottish Culture to be, i started collecting source material and visuals to get a grounded view of my ideas. One of the biggest ideas i had was adding the Gallowgate towers to atleast one piece as they serve as a prime example of over crowdedness and run down, sadly there where/ are still thousands of high flats in Glasgow and Scotland that are just like the Gallowgate towers that are located in harsh areas.

I put together some digital collages of Glasgows East End using my research and using the appropriate colours to explain my thoughts and feelings towards Scottish Culture. In doing so i believe that i was pretty successful fusing my source images with digital art to create new views into things.

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Andrew Hay

Born in 1944 in Glasgow’s East End, Hay began his painting career at the age of 39. Hay’s paintings appeari in many of the city’s museums, including the People’s Palace, Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum and the Gallery of Modern Art.

In 1990, as Glasgow celebrated its UK City of Culture status, Hay worked to develop links between art and community as artist-in-residence at three Glasgow Libraries, creating pieces under the watchful eye of the city’s school children and library visitors. The paintings still remain in community settings across the city, including Elder Park Library and Roystonhill Community Centre, as a lasting legacy of Glasgow’s cultural accolade.

Springburn Tenements (1990) by Andrew Hay

Andrew Hay added: “Libraries were an important part of my childhood and I spent many hours in Dennistoun Library as a boy, looking at the works of different artists and exploring the stories behind them.

The Barras (1987) by Andrew Hay

“Much of my work takes inspiration from the east end of Glasgow, and I hope that by installing these pieces in the local library many young people will in turn be enthused by the area and encouraged to explore their own artistic potential. I’m looking forward to meeting people from across the city and hearing what they have to say about the artwork; encouraging a two-way dialogue, debate and discussion about the work whilst inspiring others to explore their own stories and utilise their imaginations.”

A Mean Wind Wanders through the Backcourt Trash by Andrew Hay

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Oscar Marzaroli

Oscar Marzaroli is arguably Scotland’s most notable documentary photographer. His photographs and films of Glasgow from the 1950s through to the 1980s captured a period of enormous change with images of people going about their lives in the city, at work and at leisure.

Many of the black and white images depict children playing in the streets, and many simply capture the city in bygone days. Some of his most well known images detail Glasgow's Gorbals community in the 1960s. He was a photographer of great ability who captured the nature of the city and people with sensitivity and empathy. Whilst many of Marzaroli’s photographs of Glasgow are instantly recognisable, such as ‘The Castlemilk Lads’ or ‘The Golden Haired Lass’, Marzaroli worked all over Scotland and further afield as a photographer and filmmaker. A range of this subject matter is embraced in this exhibition.

Through portraits and landscapes, Marzaroli captured Scotland during an exceptional time when city slums were being cleared to make way for new social housing. It is said his images perfectly encapsulate the atmosphere surrounding those fundamental shifts in society.

In the 1980s, his work was brought to a new audience when the band Deacon Blue used his images of the city and its people on their record covers. The cover of their debut album, Raintown, was taken by Marzaroli and depicted a rainy day over Glasgow's west end with the Finnieston Crane in the background. His death on 26 August 1988, at the age of 55, left a huge body of work - more than 50,000 photographs taken by him have recently been donated to Glasgow Caledonian University in August 2019. Street Level has worked with the family and GCU in bringing the work to even wider public recognition.

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Scottish culture: Architecture based on class Colour palette

After all of my visual and online research into Glasgows architecture in two different areas, I created a colour palette for inspiration towards my art piece

Both feel familiar but are different beside each other showing again how both are on the same coin, just different sides. Alot of the colour palette comes down to materials used on the buildings of the areas and how maintained they both have been kept over the years.

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Scottish Culture: Social Prejudice

While walking down Tollcross Road, i noticed alot of new tenements where being built by private housing associations on the left, it looked presentable, well kept and fresh like it didn’t fit in, then across the road, theres graffiti spray painted along the walls, rubbish fly tipped at the corner of the street, mattresses dumped in the side of the pavement. Although Tollcross is in the East End and portrayed and labeled as an “lower class area”, private estate agency's are building and selling homes that are high standard, visually pleasing and fresh that the lower, working class can’t afford. In a way trying to flush out/ tear down the lower class to make way for the upper class.

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Scottish Culture: Architecture

Orignal Images:

I took both sets of photos walking down each road and its apparent of how each culture has affected the architecture in the lower class and upper class areas. From the get go, they both look like 2 different cities but again the sad reality is that they aren’t. This is first person, realtime images that are a scary reality into just how much an area can fall apart if unmaintained by its citizens and local councils. 

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Scottish Culture: Architecture based on lifestyle and status

My topic of interest for Scottish Culture is going to be based around the 2 different lifestyles between The lower class & upper class and how they’re lifestyles impact architecture. I will mostly focus on the lower class part as i live in the East End which is mostly “lower class” areas. I have visited the West End multiple times which is mostly known for its “Upper class” style of living so i have seen how social status affects architecture as well as how architecture affects social status

These spider mindmaps show the clear differences in advantages/ disadvantages of both classes of living.

I created a moodboard of both sides of society to give myself ispiration of what work i will produce. Its clear from the get go that both are polar oppisite as one lives in luxury and one struggles to live, wether its down to locations, clothing, food and drink. 

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Scottish Culture- Brief interpretation

Mindmap

For this brief, We have to create 1 A3 sized piece that reflects our interpretation of Scottish culture. I have created a mindmap to give me ideas of how to develop my ideas, rather than go for the common sterotypes, i’m going to develop 2 ideas that reflect modern day scottish culture and how Scotland has changed over time with its traditions/culture. I have always been fascinated by the architecture in Scotland and its one of my key inspirations one of my ideas, another idea i have had is as i live in the East End of Glasgow which is mostly known for its “rough” and “poverty stricken” areas, i may create a piece that reflects that and integrate the culture and architecture into one. I may also explore other key themes of scottish culture such as the differences between the middle class and working class, in terms of lifestyles, architecture and attitude in the overall cultures. I think it would be very interesting to explore those themes as both share different interpritaions of the same culture.

Moodboard

I have created a mood-board of my interpretation of Scottish Culture, both what i have always known it as and what i see in present day. Scottish culture is different to everyone depending on where you live and/ or what you have saw, my main focus will be on Modern Day Scottish culture and hows its adapted in the 21st century with my developing my experiences of and views.