Commissioned by Glasgow 2026 Festival, in celebration of the Commonwealth Games, a new work by Glasgow-born Jasleen Kaur, entitled ‘Superstructure’, invites Glasgow to read its infrastructure differently. The commission features a series of eight weathervane-like sculptures installed at key sites along the River Clyde connected to its history of trade, industry and empire.
This new work is conceived to be encountered casually and repeatedly, changing with light, weather and perspective. Each sculpture bears a word or phrase that turns in the wind, pointing across the city, simultaneously to its past and future. As the sculptures rotate, their texts shift orientation and meaning, acting as roving signals to the material residue of the Commonwealth; systems of judiciary, taxation and defence, infrastructure still present on the river today.
Jasleen Kaur’s ‘Superstructure’ is one of the signature commissions of Glasgow 2026 Festival, a ten-week celebration of Glasgow’s world-renowned culture, creativity and people which runs from 23 May to 9 August 2026 alongside the Commonwealth Games, funded by Commonwealth Sport.
Born in Glasgow with longstanding family ties to Govan and the Clyde, Jasleen has a deep personal connection to the river. Her background and practice, which consistently engages with questions of social justice, migration and power, shape the work’s exploration of what the Commonwealth has meant and continues to mean in a city built on global trade routes.
Jasleen created the work with research support from Glasgow-based Jude Barber of Collective Architecture, who specialises in conversation, public realm and cultural projects, and writer Louise Welsh who work together as The Empire Cafe (with their podcast Who Owns the Clyde), encouraging conversations about history, land, ownership, ecology and the ongoing effects of Empire.
Other Glasgow-based collaborators include Narro Associates, engineers with expertise in working with artists in historic settings; Scott Associates Sculpture and Design, experienced in the manufacturing for many highly regarded artists; and Helen Nisbet, Director of Glasgow International in a curatorial role.
Jasleen Kaur, Turner Prize-winning artist and GSA graduate said: “The geographer Doreen Massey says that ‘maps are not the only way to depict a place’. I see Superstructure as a kind of alternative mapping to read the city differently. They signal to the connections between infrastructure, governance and Empire. At times, the roving texts will align with buildings and spaces I intended, like the Sheriff Court or an arms factory and at other times it’s up to chance. I hope they invite a curiosity and many interpretations.”
The project marks a return to Glasgow for the artist, who graduated from the GSA’s Silversmithing and Jewellery programme in 2024. Now based in London Jasleen’s career has developed rapidly following her Turner Prize win in 2024, with recent and forthcoming institutional presentations for institutions including If the Word We, 59th Carnegie International, Carnegie, Pittsburgh; British Art Show 10: A Chorus of Strangers, and the inaugural Art Explora Art Commission at V&A East, launching in autumn 2026.
‘Superstructure’ will be installed on the banks of the River Clyde from 25 June till 10 August, before being relocated to new sites within the city.
For further information please visit glasgow2026.com
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About Jasleen Kaur
Jasleen Kaur (born 1986 in Glasgow, Scotland) is a Scottish-Indian multidisciplinary artist renowned for her inventive sculptures, installations, sound art, and socially engaged practice. She graduated from the Silversmithing and Jewellery department at Glasgow School of Art in 2008 and completed further studies in Applied Art at the Royal College of Art, London, in 2010.
Growing up in a traditional Sikh household in the Pollokshields area of Glasgow, Kaur’s work deeply reflects her diasporic identity and cultural heritage.
Kaur’s art explores the “social life of objects,” using everyday materials and ready-mades to investigate themes of cultural memory, colonial histories, and community. Jasleen describes herself as “an artist making with the slurry of life. Raised amidst betrayal, secrecy, and banished outsiders, her work is to make sense of what is out of view or withheld. She is called towards plurality, declassifications, polyphony, the blur. She is practising singing in the sediment till she is intoxicated.”
Her installation Alter Altar (2023), exhibited at Glasgow’s Tramway, combined personal and cultural artefacts—such as family photos, a classic Ford Escort draped in a doily, choral voices, and bottles of Irn-Bru to reflect on Scottish Sikh identity and communal histories – won her the 2024 Turner Prize, marking her as the youngest nominee and winner of this prestigious British art prize.
Kaur’s work has been exhibited at Tate Britain (2024), Tramway, Scotland (2023), Touchstones Rochdale (2021), Wellcome Collection, London (2021), Serpentine Civic, London (2020), Glasgow Women’s Library, Scotland (2019), Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, Newcastle (2019), MIMA, Middlesbrough (2018), Cubitt Gallery, London (2018), Eastside Projects, Birmingham (2017), Jerwood Space, London (2015).
Besides her exhibitions, Kaur has lectured at Chelsea College of Arts and the Royal College of Art. Her work is held in prominent public collections, including the Arts Council Collection and the Government Art Collection in the UK. She is also a recipient of the 2021 Paul Hamlyn Artist Award.
About The Glasgow School of Art
The Glasgow School of Art (GSA) is internationally recognised as one of Europe’s leading independent university-level institutions for education and research in the visual creative disciplines – ranking 8th in the world and 5th in Europe in the QS World University Rankings 2026. Our studio-based, specialist, practice-led teaching, learning and research draw 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 School’s history can be traced back to 1753 and the establishment of the Foulis Academy delivering a European-style art education. Today, the GSA 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 (in the Scottish Highlands) and a thriving Open Studio programme delivering non-degree provision to over 1,500 students annually.
