The 16th edition of Edinburgh Art Festival is officially underway, running from 25 July – 25 August 2019 featuring premieres of ambitious new work from internationally renowned artists.
This year’s festival stars the one and only Nathan Coley, showcasing his five-piece series “The Future is Inside Us, It’s not Somewhere Else” at Parliament Hall.
Coley’s series centers around wallpaper made by Zuber and Cie in 1834, depicting the European vision of North America at the time. Originally crafted using 1,200 woodblocks and 60 different colours, the wallpaper shows America as a kind of utopia, a paradise many would dream of calling home.
It is truly a work of art just by itself, but Nathan Coley has managed to turn into something far more meaningful than some pretty European fantasy.
Taking this wallpaper and carefully breaking it up into five separate pieces, Coley has cut a purposefully abstract message into each one, putting a lightbox behind the pictures so that the message shines through.
Speaking today, Coley said “I’ve used phrases that come from around the world… I think they allude to identity or nationality or place.”
While Coley was keen to let viewers find their own interpretation of the phrases that are so central to this series, he did share the origin story of the piece called “Looking for luck”.
He said he got the phrase from a story about a South American man travelling with his family to the Mexican/American border. When he got there, he was stopped by a journalist from CNN.
The journalist asked him “Why are you travelling to America” and the man replied, “I am looking for luck.”
The story and the phrase not only tie in well with the wallpaper’s original theme of the hope of finding a better life, they voice issues facing people in the world today, marrying past and present in a quiet yet powerful union.
The major platform for the visual arts as part of Edinburgh’s world-famous summer festival season, Edinburgh Art Festival 2019 features the work of over 300 artists from Scotland and across the world, presenting over 50 exhibitions and more than 140 events across a hugely diverse range of galleries, venues and historic and unexpected spaces throughout the city, proudly demonstrating and celebrating the strength and vitality of visual arts in Edinburgh.
