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Surrealism and Scotland

Anachronistic Pursuits: In Conversation with Catriona McAra

For over a decade, Laurence Figgis and Catriona McAra have shared an interest in the anachronistic union, and narrative possibilities, of Surrealism and the fairy tale. The most recent manifestation was ‘(After) After’ (2017), a solo exhibition by Figgis curated by McAra with an accompanying critical text by Susannah Thompson. ‘(After) After’ suggested an extension to the surrealist story, the need to find out what happens after the “happily ever after” of the movement. The exhibition made numerous references to surrealist techniques (word play, collage and metamorphosis).  This in-conversation positions Figgis’s long-term critique of the kitschification of surrealism within the Scottish cultural landscape where he has forged his artistic career. 

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The Spookier School: (Anti-)Surrealism in Glasgow

This paper poses the question ‘What is Surrealism?’ from a particular vantage point: that of a practicing artist who has lived and worked in Glasgow since the turn of the twenty-first century. With reference to my own art practice, I will consider my troubled relationship with the category ‘Surrealism,’ as contingent with the specific trends of the Glasgow art-scene during this period and the broader international context.

In particular, I will address the apparent interest in surrealist methods demonstrated by Glasgow-based artists in the early 2000s (in opposition to the neo-conceptual and relational aesthetic genres that had placed prominent Glasgow artists on the international map in the previous decade). Whilst acknowledging the value of research into the historical surrealist movement (for shaping a more rigorous understanding of my practice), I will also recount my frustrations with the movement as they emerge in two areas: doubt regarding the ‘revolutionary’ power of the unconscious, and the potential valorisation of ‘linear’ narrative thinking – even in the domain of the ‘fantastic’. Read more →