The three tapestries that result from the creative partnership of Scottish contemporary artist, Christine Borland, and Edinburgh’s Dovecot Tapestry studios have just gone on show at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. They will hand in the Renaissance Galleries from March until May 2024 before returning to Edinburgh where they will hang in the University’s Edinburgh Futures Institute, originally the Royal Infirmary.
Christine Borland was commissioned to work with Dovecot in 2019 on a project to commemorate the seven female medical students who were matriculated into the University of Edinburgh in 1869, the first female university students
in the UK. While the University increasingly supported their studies, the city authorities forced their removal and those who became doctors achieved their qualifications on the Continent. Their leader, Sophia Jex-Blake returned to Edinburgh in 1878 where she set up a practice on Manor Place. There are several fascinating items in the University’s Centre for Research Collections witnessing to her work, and her support of other women.
In 2020 Edinburgh photographer, Laurence Winram, was commissioned to make a photographic reworking of Rembrandt’s Anatomy Lesson of Dr Nicolaes Tulp which now hangs in the Sophia Jex-Blake common room in the Chancellor’s Building at Edinburgh BioQuarter.
Carol’s article on the tapestry and Christine Borland’s rich vein of history and connections will feature in issue 5 of the Journal of Scottish Yarns, out in May.
