Impact Arts

Young people on our Creative Pathways employability programme in Glasgow are busy creating public artwork for the Dalmarnock area of Glasgow’s East End as part of McTaggart Group’s new housing development in the area.

We are delighted to be in partnership with McTaggart for their Dalmarnock Riverside development, which will involve our artists and participants consulting and working with the community to bring colour to the development, creating artwork reflecting the needs and wants of the area.

While the group continue to learn new creative skills and get support to find work, they are carrying out research into the history of Dalmarnock. They visited the archives department at the Mitchell Library where archivist Michael Gallagher showed them nineteenth century maps, building plans, antique company catalogues and photographs.

This was incredibly useful in helping the young people get an insight into the changing history of the area. They were particularly interested in a dye works famous for production of ‘turkey red’ – expect vibrant colours in the final piece!

The group are also enjoying learning about contemporary art. Tutor Allan Whyte presented to the group on the subject, before they took a trip to the Lighthouse and the Gallery of Modern Art. They saw works by Warhol, Paolozzi, Douglas Gordon and Andy Goldsworthy, as well an exhibition that was part of Glasgow International festival. This trip got the group thinking about how to convey concepts and ideas through artwork – all valuable preparation for the final work in Dalmarnock.

The team’s photography skills have also been progressing well over the past few eeeks. After working on pinhole cameras, they moved onto digital photography. They set up a studio to work on portraits, with the group also learning how to use Photoshop. Their light art experiments led to some really cool images.

Four weeks and plenty of work to be done… we’ll keep you posted here on the blog!

The project lasts ten weeks and is open to 16-17 year olds in Glasgow who are not in employment, education or training. This project is funded by Skills Development Scotland, Our Bright Future, the Big Lottery Fund and Inspiring Scotland.