biography
Alec Finlay (Scotland, 1966) is an internationally-recognised artist and poet whose work crosses over a range of media and forms. Much of Finlay's work considers how we as a culture, or cultures, relate to landscape and ecology. Through permanent and temporary interventions, integrative web-based projects, and publications, Finlay weaves together generous experiential works, often collaborative, sometimes mapped directly onto the landscape, embedded socially or accessed online. Recently Finlay's work has focussed on place-awareness and ecopoetics.
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Selected Solo Exhibitions and Commissions
2018
Question & Answers (after Paul Celan), permanent public artwork, Southwark Park, commissioned by CGP Gallery
2018
Retrospective, Arizona Poetry Centre
2017 - 2018
a far-off land, artwork, publication, for Macmillan Cancer Support
2017
th’ fleety wud, artwork, publication, comm by CABN, Scottish Borders Heritage Festival
2017
minnmouth, artwork, publication, funded by North Light Arts and FVU
2016 -2017
From Creag a’ Mhadaidh to Abhainn Choilltidh, public events, artworks, blog, publication, commissioned by Trees for Life and Common Ground
2016 A Variety of Cultures, permanent public artwork, publication, comm. by Jupiter Artland
2015 - 2018
Gathering, artworks and publication, commissioned by Hauser & Wirth for Fife Arms Hotel / Invercauld Estate, Braemar
2014
there were our own / there were the others, book and memorial walk, commissioned by National Trust
2014
Taigh, National memorial for organ donors, Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh, commissioned by Scottish Government
2014
a-ga: on mountains, exhibition, sleeper gallery, Edinburgh
2014
100 flowers, permanent artwork, commissioned by New South Glasgow Hospitals
2014
wallflowers, permanent artwork and publication, Callendar House, Falkirk, commissioned by the Falkirk Community Trust
2014
Some Colour Trends, walks and publication, commissioned by Deveron Arts
2014
Global Oracle, permanent artwork, publication, audio, in collaboration with Chris Watson, commissioned by The University of Warwick
2013
Sweeney’s Bothy, permanent dwelling, in collaboration with The Bothy Project, funded by Creative Scotland
2013
The Bee Bole, multi-venue sculptural installations, artist blog, funded by ACE
2013
comhlan bheanntan | a company of mountains, artist blog & publication,
commissioned by ATLAS Arts, Skye
2013
Vocable Orchard, animation, print & exhibition, comm. by Film & Video Umbrella
2013
today today today, animation, artist blog, booklet, embroidery, commissioned by Animate Projects
2013
Out of Books, walk, sculpture, artist blog, with Ken Cockburn, funded by NALD
2013
Duke’s Wood (bower construction, embroidery, blog), commissioned by Ordinary Culture
2013
I Hear Her Cry, sculpture & publication, private commission, Boston, NY
2012
Swarm (ASX), sculpture & artist blog, commissioned by 18th Biennale of Sydney
2012
The Bee Library, public artwork, Yorkshire Sculpture Park
2011
birdsong & the city’s a stonebook & SING/WILD/KIND/WOOD (permanent public
artworks, web-audio work, print edition), Victoria Gardens, Leeds
2010
The Road North (public artwork, website, print, audio & exhibition) with Ken Cockburn
2010 Walking Within Langais Wood (permanent public artwork & word-map print), Langass, North Uist
2010
sky-wheels & Sky Colour Wheel, exhibition, commissioned by AV Festival 10, Hatton Gallery, Newcastle
2010
white peak / dark peak, walk, artist blog and publication, Derbyshire Arts
Development Group, Peak District National Park
2010
Rosary (poem garden), Castle Park Arts Centre, Frodsham
2009
Home to a king (3) (public artwork & field-guide), Yorkshire Sculpture Park; Durham University Botanic Garden; Springburn Park (Glasgow); St Andrews Botanic Garden (St Andrews); George Square Gardens (Edinburgh); Montgomery Street Gardens (Edinburgh); Castle Park Arts Centre (Frodsham); Cove Park (Kilcreggan).
2009
Mesostic Interleaved (public artwork & publication), Edinburgh University Library
2008
Noses Point: Coastal Walk (public art & field-guide), Seaham, County Durham
2007-8
Specimen Colony, permanent sculpture and publication, comm. by The Bluecoat Gallery, Liverpool
2007
Three Estates Renga (public artwork & publication with Gavin Wade), Birmingham
2007
Floating Island Garden (1) (artist residency & word-map), Northumbria Coast AONB
2005
Avant-Garde English Landscape, residency, exhibition & permanent artwork, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, West Bretton
2005
Woodland Platform, permanent artwork, the hidden gardens, Tramway, Glasgow
Selected two-person and group Exhibitions
2018
HUTOPIA, Machines a Penser, Prada Foundation, Venice Architecture Biennale
2018
Common Ground, Yorkshire Sculpture Park
2018
wild city | fiadh-bhaile, with The Walking Library, for Festival 2018
2017
broken flowers, Taigh Chearsabhagh Museum & Arts Centre, North Uist
2017
FLOERS, with Hannah Imlach, Dunbar Town House Gallery, Dunbar
2017
Somewhere Becoming Sea, Hull City of Culture, Humber Street Gallery, Hull
2016
MOUNTAIN LINE / RYOSEN, Botao Gallery, Nagoya, Japan
2016
SALT Festival, Folkestone
2015
The Shock of Victory, CCA, Glasgow
2015
Love Letters to a (Post)-Europe, performance of a better tale to tell, BIOS, Athens
2015
Material Concerns, LifeSpace, University of Dundee
2014
GENERATION, Edinburgh International Art Festival, Talbot Rice Gallery
2014
Wordsworth & Basho: Walking Poets, Dove Cottage
2014
Art Lending Library (II), Market Gallery, Glasgow
2014
Walk on, various locations (Art Circuit, London)
2014
A Particular Kind of Solitude (Elizabeth Street Garden, New York)
2013 The Road North: with Ken Cockburn, at Walk On (Art Circuit), Pitshanger Gallery, London, touring to NGCA (Sunderland), Mac (Birmingham), the Atkinson (Southport), and Plymouth City Art Gallery
2013
‘distant mountains are blue’, Walking Encyclopedia, airspace gallery, Stoke on Trent
2010
Northern Art Prize 2010, shortlisted artists’ exhibition, Leeds Art Gallery
2010
Eundan : Aviary, An Lanntair, Stornoway
2008
Specimen Colony, The Bluecoat Gallery, Liverpool
2007
The Printed Path: Landscape, Walking and Recollection, Tate Britain, London
2007
Waterlog, Castle Museum & Art Gallery and Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts (Norwich), touring to The Collection (Lincoln)
2005 - 2006
Ball Im Kopf, Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg, Hamburg
2003 - 2004
Outside of a Dog: Artists’ Books, BALTIC, Gateshead
2002
Labanotation, Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead
Selected Artist Residencies
2017
John Muir Trust Residency, North Light Arts, Dunbar
2016 - 2017
University of Aberdeen, gathering, Leverhulme Trust
2015 - 2017
Fife Arms Hotel / Invercauld Estate, Braemar, Hauser & Wirth
2013
The Bee Bole (research and on-campus artworks), University of Stirling, funded by Leverhulme Trust
2013
Outlandia, Glen Nevis (July 2013)
2011 - 2012
Skying (Art & Renewable Energy Project) University of Northumbria,
Newcastle, funded by Leverhulme Trust
2008 - 2009
RHS Gardens, Harlow Carr, Hyde Hall, Wisley, Rosemoor
2007 - 2009
New and Renewable Energy Centre, Blyth, Northumberland
2007
Kielder Partnership, Kielder Observatory, Kielder
2006
Killhope Leadmining Museum, Killhope, North Pennines
2005 - 2007
Science Learning Centre North East, Durham
2004 - 2005
Creative Partnerships Artist for eight schools in the Durham-Sunderland region 2003-05 Yorkshire Sculpture Park
2002 - 2003
BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art
Selected Recent Awards
2018
Scottish Design Award, Winner Best Graphic Publication, for a far-off land
2016
Shortlisted Artist, Land Art Generator Initiative, Glasgow
2015
Scottish Design Award (Best Publication and Grand Prix Award) for
there were our own / there were the others
2011
Finalist, Artistic Landmarks In Contemporary Experience (ALICE) Awards
2010
Shortlisted Artist, The Northern Art Prize, 2010
2007
String of Pearls, Dysart Artworks, Winner best work of art in the public realm, Scottish Design Awards
2007
Northern Canon first major North-East Art Commission Award
2006
Northern Rock Three Year Sustainability Award
2006
First International Edible Art Award, ‘Isles and Lakes’ (Biscuit patterns)
2000
Scottish Design Awards (Best Typography, Best Book; Chairman’s Award) for pocketbooks series
Selected Recent Publications
2018
wild city (published by morning star)
2018
gathering (published by Hauser & Wirth)
2018
Machines á Penser (published by Prada Foundation)
2017
a far-off land (published by morning star)
2017
minnmouth (published by morning star, North Light Arts)
2016
A Variety of Cultures (published by Jupiter Artland)
2016
Arboreal: A collection of new woodland writing, ed. Adrian Cooper (Little Toller Books)
2016
‘The Difference’, and ‘In Randomania, Joiny-Uppy-Land, and the Lands of the Free and Un-free, We Used to Say’, Gymnasium, edited by Ruth Ewan, Annika Eriksson and Raqs Media Collective (Site Gallery)
2015
ebban an’ flowan, with Laura Watts and Alister Peebles (published by morning star)
2015
I Hear Her Cry (published by Ingleby Gallery)
2015
A better tale to tell: submissions to The Smith Commission (published by CCA Glasgow, National Library of Scotland, Saltire Society, Scottish Poetry Library)
2015
Some flowers among the ruins (published by Callender Park)
2014
Some Colour Trends (published by Deveron Arts)
2014
there were our own / there were the others (commissioned by National Trust, England & Wales) 2014 The Road North, with Ken Cockburn (Shearsman)
2014
Taigh: a wilding garden (morning star & Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop, commissioned by the Scottish Government)
2014
Global Oracle (University of Warwick Art Collection)
2014
Sweeney on Eigg (Corbell Stone Press)
2014
a-ga: on mountains (morning star & University of Sunderland)
2014
Seeding the John Muir Way (commissioned by UZ Arts)
2014
‘Glenelg’, ‘The Singing Sands’, ‘What is a mountain?’, from The Road North,
Shearsman 99 & 100, April 2014
2014
‘Islands’, Transnational Literature Vol. 7 no. 1 (November 2014)
2013
thorns (sine wave peak) commissioned by the Centre for Artist Books
2013 a company of mountains (morning star)
2013
today today today (Playspace Publications)
2013
‘three walks,’ The Art of Walking (Black Dog)
2012
Be My Reader (Shearsman Books)
2012
Ian Hamilton Finlay: Selections, ed. (University of California Press)
2011
‘W-I-L-D-H-A-W-T-H-O-R-N-P-R-E-S-S’, The Present Order: Writings on the Work of Ian Hamilton Finlay (Marfa Books)
2010
white peak / dark peak, morning star & re:place
2010
‘Towers That Flower’, Cultural Politics Journal (vol. 6) 2009 ‘Dictionary of Imagined Flowers’, Sunfish (Winter, no. 1)
2009
Mesostic Interleaved (The University of Edinburgh Press)
2009
Says You (Oysetercatcher Press)
2009
Mesostic Remedy, (morning star publications)
Selected Reviews
2018
2017
Tarbuck, A & Kotva S 2017, ‘The Non-Secular Pilgrimage: Walking and Looking in Ken Cockburn and Alec Finlay’s The Road North’, Critical Survey, Vol 29 No 1, Spring
2016
Liprot A 2016, ‘Island books: ebban an’ flowan’, The Island Review 20 January
2015
Paterson K 2015, ‘Creating art out of the indyref’, The National 19th September
‘Vision of Scotland’: Poet publishes opus based on submissions to Smith Commission’ RT UK 18 September 2015
Green C 2015, ‘Scottish poet crafts epic poem from ordinary Scots' requests for devolved powers to Holyrood’, The Independent 9th September
Smith S 2015, ‘The Shock of Victory: Work from international artists looking at political struggle and imagining victory’, The List 3rd September
Brown A 2015, ‘Effacing the Ego’ Stride Magazine March 2015
Brown A 2015, Review of The Road North by Ken Cockburn & Alec Finlay, Scottish Pen
‘Review’, TLS, January 2015
Croggan A 2015, Review: Ian Hamilton Finlay by Alec Finlay, Oyster Boy Review, Fall 2015
2014
‘The Walking Encyclopaedia – DAY NINE – something new from Alec Finlay’ AirSpace Gallery 5th February 2014
2013
MacRitchie K 2013, ‘A book is performance: Exhibition of Artists’ Books at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art’ PINSO 29 April
Williamson C 2013, Review of TodayTodayToday, Playspace Publications, 6 May
2012
Staff H 2012, ‘The Generative, the Lyric, and Wittgenstein's Norway: Alec Finlay's Be My Reader’, Poetry Foundation, 31 October
Williams T 2012, Blog Review 15: Tony Williams Reviews Alec Finlay’s ‘Be My Reader’, Magma Poetry, October 30 2012
Yeung H 2012, ‘Fragmented Inheritence’ PN Review 208 Volume 39 Number 2 November – December
Strang E 2012, ‘Em Strang reviews new poetry pamphlets by Angela McSeveney, Donald Mackay and Alec Finlay’, Scottish Review of Books 7 November 2012
Sutczak P 2012, ‘Swarm (ASX) & The bee library’ Write Response 27th August 2012
2009
‘Artists lead the way as festival prepares to bring in the crowds’, Derby Telegraph 11 September
2008
Mlechevska V 2008, ‘Thoughts Within Thoughts’, KulturaIssue 25 (2008) 3 July
2005
Sam S, ‘THERE WHERE YOU ARE NOT’, MAP #3 Autumn 2005 August