After his talk in Week 4 I have closely been following the exhibitions of curator James Clegg at the Talbot Rice Gallery in Edinburgh. To participate in their public programming ahead of thinking about my own projects’, I chose to attend the opening night of Trading Zone 2025, an ‘interdisciplinary student exhibition’ building on the premise of ‘nuanced stories about the global, local and diverse issues concerning creative practitioners today’. In addition to a limited viewing of the exhibition itself, the night also featured a performance lecture from artist and researcher Rita Mahfouz. Although I am aware that they are hosting further public events such as intimate screenings and creative writing workshops, it is this first event I will focus on.
The Exhibition
I thought that the curation of this exhibition was visually interesting but as a visitor I found it a bit confusing. In the main hall of Talbot Rice numerous large scale works were all placed in the room together, which as a waiting area of an event allowed for a great conversation starter and congregating point, but made experience the artworks difficult due to their close proximity. Especially with the majority of the pieces being large installation or sculptural works, I personally would have liked more space in-between each piece as seen at Tramway’s retrospective of Maud Sulter (2024-25). Upstairs the exhibition worked a lot better, with my favourite work being Emily Beany’s 2021 video work Deviant. Although it does not directly engage with my curatorial project, I found the layering of the experience of endometriosis alongside imagery of the ocean really moving, making me think about how we record our daily experiences of personal moments. How can we communicate these silent struggles and constructed networks of kinship found through pain?
The Performance
I really enjoyed Rita Mahfouz’s performance lecture highlighting the change in architecture in Beirut as a result of political unrest. In between her discussion of her experience being in Beirut, Mahfouz played video and audio of the streets, emphasising the way that things have changed now that glass windows and doors have been replaced with seemingly invisible boards – supplementing her sculpture on the same topic also in the exhibition. As a piece of public programming I think that this lecture worked extremely well, opening the exhibition with clear intentions that that is the extent to which social and political turmoil can affect the daily lives of citizens. The use of audio within the setting of a large ornate library immersed the audience, forcing you to engage with the work. I thought that this was a very clever play in the space between a lecture, a performance, and an artist talk. I think that having a talk or some kind of interactive experience is something that I definitely want to experiment with in my public programming, allowing me to immediately engage participants in my project. The intentions of the workshop, as seen in this exhibition, become clearer after a talk.
https://www.trg.ed.ac.uk/exhibition/trading-zone-2025
https://www.tramway.org/event/4e836955-14b9-4bf9-b8ff-b210011e33ae/
