Joan Eardley
‘Early Eardley: Selected Works 1940-1950’
Reid Gallery and Window on Heritage
Reid Building, The Glasgow School of Art, 167 Renfrew Street, Glasgow, G3 6RQ
Exhibition runs from Friday 10 November – Sunday 16 December | FREE admission
Joan Eardley (1921-1963) is one of Scotland’s most celebrated artists, best known for her depictions of Glasgow’s street children and of Scotland’s north east coastline. This exhibition offers the opportunity to see Eardley’s early works, for which she is lesser known, in order to show the ways in which her formative time at The Glasgow School of Art and early experiences from 1940-1950 informed the direction and development of her later work.
Early Eardley: Selected Works 1940-1950 will introduce audiences to the artist as a young woman, still learning, experimenting and developing as a painter. The drawings demonstrate Eardley’s emerging talent and the range and breadth of her interests. Materials Eardley used in her work included pen, ink, chalks, watercolour, and blue biro.
Italian Farmhouse (1948/49), Joan Eardley (1921-1963) In the collections of The Glasgow School of Art Archives & Collections © Estate of Joan Eardley. All Rights Reserved, DACS 2023 (see editors’ notes)
The works for this exhibition are drawn from The Glasgow School of Art Archives & Collections, Lillie Art Gallery, City Art Centre, Gerber Fine Art, and the Joan Eardley Estate. The exhibition will feature life drawings made while Eardley was a student in the 1940s, as well as drawings made while undertaking The Glasgow School of Art and RSA Carnegie Traveling Scholarships in Italy and France (1948-49). Some of these drawings – of people, landscape and architecture – will be shown along with the scholarship report she was required to submit to the then Director, Douglas Percy Bliss, and other correspondence.
The exhibition will also include a small group of sketches from Lincolnshire made during a period spent in the country to undertake a mural commission at a school in 1946. A further two drawings from the GSA’s Archives & Collections are of scenes from Glasgow’s famous Barras Market.
Covered Market, Glasgow (circa 1945-49) Joan Eardley NMC/0087 In the collection of The Glasgow School of Art Archives & Collections © Estate of Joan Eardley. All Rights Reserved, DACS 2023 (see editors’ notes)
This exhibition is curated by Jenny Brownrigg, Director of GSA Exhibitions, and Professor Susannah Thompson, Head of Doctoral Studies at the GSA. It is in partnership with The Glasgow School of Art Archives & Collections.
Susannah Thompson is an art historian, writer, and critic from Newcastle-Upon-Tyne. Her research has focused on artists’ writing, experimental, and creative approaches to art criticism, feminism, class, and contemporary art. In recent years, she has undertaken projects on artists and writers including Muriel Spark, Joan Eardley, Cordelia Oliver, and Maud Sulter. As a critic, she writes for Art Review, Artforum, The Burlington Magazine, and others.
Jenny Brownrigg is Exhibitions Director at The Glasgow School of Art. Her research interests include modern and contemporary Scottish women artists. She curated Glean: early 20th century women filmmakers and photographers in Scotland (City Art Centre, Edinburgh, 2022/23) and Co-roinn Glean, Museum Nan Eilean (Lionacleit), Isle of Benbecula, 2023 (In partnership with Vanishing Scotland Archive). Previously curated exhibitions include Franki Raffles: Observing Women at Work, 2017, in the Reid Gallery, The Glasgow School of Art.
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Notes for Editors
About The Glasgow School of Art (GSA):
The Glasgow School of Art is internationally recognised as one of Europe’s leading independent university-level institutions for education and research in the visual creative disciplines. Our studio-based, specialist, practice-led teaching, learning and research draws talented individuals with a shared passion for visual culture and creative production from all over the world.
Originally founded in 1845 as one of the first Government Schools of Design, the GSA’s history can be traced back to 1753 and the establishment of the Foulis Academy delivering a European-style art education. Today, The Glasgow School of Art is an international community of over 3,500 students and staff across architecture, design, digital, fine art, and innovation in our campuses in Glasgow and Altyre, with a thriving Open Studio programme delivering non-degree provision to over 1,500 students annually.
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