Explorations of endometriosis, medieval re-enactment, and living through conflict are among the artworks from 10 Edinburgh College of Art (ECA) students featured in the latest exhibition at the Talbot Rice Gallery.
Trading Zone is an interdisciplinary student exhibition, with work selected by the gallery.
At the exhibition opening, ECA Principal Professor Juan Cruz said: “I would like to say on behalf of ECA and Talbot Rice Gallery – a huge congratulations to all the participating students. Your brilliant work and dedication to the exhibition have created something really special. In these difficult times, it is a pleasure to have such a resounding celebration of what we can achieve at ECA.”
He said the quality of the exhibition reflected the quality of teaching at ECA, and thanked all those who had mentored and supported the students involved.
Exhibitors received valuable guidance from gallery curator James Clegg with support from Colm Clarke, Senior Technician, and Holly Morton, Assistant Technician.
Featured artists
Keziah Greenwood, MA Contemporary Art Practice, has made an ambitious installation that sees her sculptures become part of a dramatic stage set. Reclaiming the monstrous from classical mythology, she offers us a portal into an imaginative realm of identity politics.
Hanayo Kubota, BA (Hons) Illustration, was inspired by a reportage project to retell the stories of people who have lived through conflict. One work follows the heart-rending story of a Syrian couple fleeing for their lives; the second results from a new collaboration with a journalist who has reported on the challenges Palestinian children living in the West Bank face when trying to get to school.
Emilie Fielding, BA (Hons) Painting, is passionate about medieval re-enactment. Both a homage to these living history groups – including family members – and a reflection of transitioning Pagan ideas, Emilie’s work centres on the traditions surrounding bee-keeping.
Rita Mahfouz, PhD Art – Her sculptural work for the exhibition is hiding in plain sight – a covered doorway that reflects the transformation of her home-city of Beirut following a series of crises. For Rita, the many panels covering windows and doors across the city mirror the attempted concealment and disarray of the political system – something expanded upon in her upcoming performance lecture on Friday 21 March.
Eilidh McKeown, MA Fine Art, presents an iconic image of the money-saving guru Martin Lewis, who she formally connects to a history of industrial action though a large banner. A series of portraits of polarising characters on toast extend this theme. This is a project about changing faith in an era of austerity and social change and how cultural identities based on either/or values reflect a violence that trickles down into everyday realities.
Ross Dickson, BA (Hons) Fine Art, is fascinated by the way archaeological sites carry a mystery that haunts our attempts to understand them. His deconstructed studio or dig – punctuated by uncanny digital representations of landscapes and objects – warps our sense of spatial and temporal timescales.
Emily Beaney, PhD Design, presents a 16mm film made with women who suffer from endometriosis. It is at once a platform for their voices – against a backdrop of woeful neglect of women’s reproductive health issues – and an experimental film that asks how artworks can support our understanding of chronic illness.
Wenqi Zou, PhD Design, offers up an abstract – almost sci-fi vision – distilled from classical and traditional women’s medical practice. Interested in ritual, natural energies and collective forms of healing, she is asking if there could be a place in the world alongside modern medicine for another form of spiritual wellbeing.
Inayah, BA (Hons) Sculpture, has created a contemplative space for us to read the accounts of people who experience challenges on account of their intersecting identities. Guided by Buraq, a mythical horse that can traverse earthly and heavenly domains, the work offers a kind of sanctuary for open, unfixed identities.
Victoria Evans, PhD Design, presents a sound work that uses data from the European Space Agency related to 11 satellites. As the satellites undertake epic missions to Mercury, mapping the sun or monitoring the melting of the icecaps, it is a project that connects the way we perceive of the vastness of outer space and our local, embodied awareness.
Also in the exhibition is the work of Maria Schiza, PhD in Creative Writing in the University’s School of Literatures, Languages and Cultures. Maria specialises in ekphrasis, which is the use of language to describe artworks. She bravely took on the challenge of writing responses to all of the works in the exhibition, capturing them in short, evocative poems.
Trading Zone runs until 31 May 2025 - find out more via the link below.
