1. GSA Archives:
2. My thoughts at point:
3. More Media:
4. Chat with Neil:
5. Chat with Cat:
6. Development Sketches:
7. Mitchell Library:

At the end of last week I spend some time working on some design aspects of the project within my new framing of being more abstract with it or less like a real exhibition in a museum and trying to do everything myself when usually it would be a team of people for each section.

Sadly the quest of finding unknown stories of Clydebank and Glasgow might have been too much of an ask so along with being less literal with the outcome I’ll be less laser focused on one aspect when considering my focus for the exhibition which I think might allow me to be more artistically open than before.

At this moment I want to select a couple of objects from the GSA archives, Katie at the archives who have suggested a few great work to include, some not digitised yet but I would love to have digital copies, physical copies or even the real work displayed in my collection. Katie has also put me in contact with one of her colleagues Jennifer who is in the WestDunbartonshire archives, so that might supply me with even more material.

GSA Archives:

Katie in the archives has already suggested the photography work of Robert Trotter who was a street photographer from Dumbarton (which I have also spent most of my life as my mothers family is from there) who has one digitised work (seen below) and a collection in the archives that I’d like to see properly and integrate into my project.

My thoughts at point:

At this point of the project as my focus shifts and the project shifts so does my feelings towards it, before I was feeling stressed and a lot of pressure to produce meaningful work or to do something that has never been done before. But as the shift focuses more to artistic curation and displaying and engaging in work as well as helping others engage with it I cant stop thinking about the C.S. Lewis quote :

“Even in literature and art, no man who bothers about originality will ever be original: whereas if you simply try to tell the truth (without caring twopence how often it has been told before) you will, nine times out of ten, become original without ever having noticed it”

I also think the meaning of this exhibition has shifted, and not just in a literal sense as the outcome will be different as I imagined it, but for myself, I’m not really sure I even know what it was before but now its a subtle celebration of where I grew up, Clydebank, Dumbarton and Glasgow, after trying to distance myself for so long, those who shaped me, my family and my friends who would encourage my creative spirit as I would try and see myself as a one man army doing it all myself and my creative interests and endeavours that have been with me from a young age, encouraged by those around me and what I aim to continue into my life.

More Media:

As well as photography displayed from the GSA archives, I’d also like to get some archival footage of Glasgow, Clydebank and Dumbarton, so I’ve had a look at the National Library of Scotlands video archives and would either like to stabilise some footage and have it playing through to add to the overall theme and aid in the story of the project or to use them for a piece of my own work that I can display alongside the archival work.

https://www.nls.uk/

Chat with Neil:

Chat with Cat:

Development Sketches:

Mitchell Library:

During my appointment at the Mitchell Library I was told firstly that any pictures I take had to be documented and that anything from their archive was not allowed for exhibition or display of any kind, so anything I did find or found interesting can only be shown here in my research.

That being said, even though its not for my exhibition this was still eye opening and moving to see real stories of the people of Glasgow and really put it into perspective that if I am using these photographs from the past that, I know it might seem obvious, but that they are real people.