Glasgow encourages art for and by its people, making even a short trip to the Scottish city a great introduction to the cultural life of the place, writes Tony Clayton-Lea
THE MOST frequently raised topic in Glasgow at the moment, it seems, is not the increase in price of a deep-fried Mars bar but the rather more pressing subject of art.
On a recent two-day visit the same three questions were asked several times a day: what is art, why fund artists whose work doesn't necessarily adhere to traditional artistic principles and are these latter types simply having a laugh at the expense of people who don't want to look ignorant about the conceptual-art process?
In Glasgow, questions of this nature aren't being asked pretentiously, or with malice or sarcasm aforethought. Instead they are pondered seriously and at great length over a meal or a drink.
One of the main reasons they are being asked at all is an event called Glasgow International Festival of Contemporary Visual Art, aka the Gi Festival.
The biennial event finished at the end of April, yet its reverberations will continue to be felt. The Gi isn't planning on going away, which is just as well, as it is, irrespective of your definition of art, a varied and thought-provoking sequence of exhibitions, "happenings" and installations, with work from home-grown talent such as Jim Lambie, Alasdair Gray and the Timorous Beasties collective and from international names such as the Polish painter Wilhelm Sasnal and the New York-based Kalup Linzy.
But back to the question of what constitutes a work of art. Seen at the festival were the following: patterned shattered glass on a floor (Jonathan Monk's Something No Less Important Than Nothing and Nothing No Less Important Than Something, at the Tramway); a low-budget film of a tightrope walker negotiating a high wire suspended between Glasgow's Red Road flats (Catherine Yass's High Wire, at the Centre for Contemporary Arts); vinyl album sleeves encased in concrete blocks (Jim Lambie's Forever Changes, at the Gallery of Modern Art); piled-up blocks of wood (Rachel Mimiec's Looking Out, Looking In, at the Tramway); self-generating sound produced by the monitoring of tectonic shifts beneath the earth's surface (Stephen Hurrel's Beneath and Beyond, at the the Tramway); and a video loop of a deranged vampire-like figure screaming an arrhythmic composition derived from various national anthems (Adel Abdessemed's Trust Me, at 21 Woodlands Terrace).
These and other works turned heads, raised smirks and provoked debate. They also highlighted the nature of what makes Glasgow, as a cultural entity, tick. For years the city's artists have expressed a deep, abiding love - accompanied by frustration - for their home city through art that is arguably fuller of protein than its London counterpart.
The theme of the Gi Festival, says its director, Francis McKee, is "public and private, two very pertinent topics to the civic life of the city".
The city undoubtedly has a wide range of art spaces to visit. Based in what was once the town house of a tobacco trader, the neoclassical Gallery of Modern Art (GoMA) - the second-most-visited contemporary-art gallery outside London - on Royal Exchange Square features many Glaswegian artists, including Ross Sinclair, John Byrne, Christine Borland and Ken Currie.
Every exhibition at GoMA is described in terms that casual observers can follow, and the gallery prides itself on its efforts to connect with the wider community (its small balcony galleries regularly display the work of local schoolchildren and adult groups).
Somewhat edgier is the Centre for Contemporary Arts (CCA), on Sauchiehall Street. Featuring five spacious exhibition and performance rooms that surround what appears to be a drop-in space for students, artists and the city's boho crowd, the centre's aesthetic seems to be that the avant-garde needn't be exclusive or elitist, which is why its Saturday-morning kids' club workshops are so well attended.
Factor in a monthly book fair (Cecelia Ahern novels at reduced prices? - don't think so), and regular music nights at the weekend, and you've got a slightly highbrow working venue with a sensibly Scottish perspective.
Across the city in Finnieston is SWG3, a former Commes des Garçons warehouse that has been (and is continuing to be) transformed by local arts facilitators into a late-opening bar, cafe, club, gallery and performance space. It's a run-down, quite messy place, populated by people with as much business sense as artistic nous, yet if anywhere typifies Glasgow as a cultural centre, SWG3 is it. Lottery-funded art is not on SWG3's agenda, according to McKee. "They want to do something much more down to earth, much more local," he says.
From artists' studios to rehearsal spaces, from no central heating to forging art in the heat of discourse and debate, SWG3 is, as much as GoMA, CCA and others, art for the people by the people.
More down to earth, more local? No wonder we like Glasgow so much.
Go there
Aer Lingus (
www.aerlingus.com) flies to Glasgow from Dublin. Ryanair (
www.ryanair.com) flies to Glasgow from Dublin, Cork. Shannon and Belfast.
Where to stay and go
Where to stay
Glasgow caters for all budgets, from the boutique Hotel du Vin (1 Devonshire Gardens, 00-44-141-3392001,
www.hotelduvin.com) to the likes of Travelodge, Ramada and Holiday Inn. I stayed as a guest of the Radisson SAS Hotel (301 Argyle Street, 00- 44-141-2043333,
www.glasgow.radissonsas.com): smart, modern interiors, spacious business-class rooms and some cute design touches.
Where to eat
Blas is the Gaelic for taste or flavour, and you get both at the recently opened Blas (1397 Argyle Street, Kelvingrove, 00-44-141-3574328,
www.blasrestaurant.com), with its neat design hints amid superbly executed Scottish food. Minus points, however, for the tawdry toilets.
Outside the city centre is one of Glasgow's best new restaurants, Two Fat Ladies at the Buttery (652 Argyle Street, 00-44-141-2218188, www.twofatladiesrestaurant.com). The sticky toffee pudding is, ahem, orgasmic.
Where to go
Glasgow is a year-round arts destination, with changing exhibitions in all of the city's galleries. Of continual interest are Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, the Burrell Collection (both
www.glasgowmuseums.com) and the Tramway (
www.tramway.org).
To mark the 70th anniversary of the 1938 Empire Exhibition, Glasgow's Lighthouse, in association with Scottish Screen Archive, presents Films from the Empire, a selection of rare amateur and documentary films that recorded the exhibition. Until June 22nd. www.thelighthouse.co.uk.
Harry Benson: A Photographer's Journey celebrates the 60-year career of the renowned Glaswegian photographer in what amounts to a homecoming exhibition. As well as images from his recent book, Harry Benson's Glasgow, there are photographs of The Beatles (with whom Benson travelled the US in 1964), world leaders and icons of music, fashion and film. Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum.
Until September 14th. www.glasgowmuseums.com.