The Great Glen Artists Airshow
Saturday 18 and Sunday 19 September 2010

The Great Glen Artists Airshow - a unique, unusual and rewarding participatory art experience with activities that redefine the air as medium taking place at either end of the huge natural fissure that is the Great Glen. Previous Arts Catalyst artists airshows, in 2004 and 2007, involved artists flying objects or investigating aeronautical culture. In common with these earlier aishows movement through air and landscape will be explored. Yet this year’s event will be more abstract, redefining the philosophical territory of the air and the ownership, or the mapping of the spatial landscape.  

At one end of the Great Glen will be the main site, at the Highland Institute for Contemporary Art (HICA), with activities taking place on nearby Loch Ruthven, in the woodlands and on the open brae, or fell.  At the other end of the Glen will be the unique Utopian venture, Outlandia, a treehouse for artists in the sky, overlooking Ben Nevis.

SATURDAY 18 SEPTEMBER
The Great Glen Artists Airshow, free performances and events at HICA 2-5pm

• an airborne investigation of wind currents above Loch Ruthven by Dutch artists Esther Polak and Ivar van Bekkum. Polak will be extending her inventive use of global positioning (GPS) technology in her live performance beside the water.  
• Bruce Gilchrist and Jo Joelson of London Fieldworks  will present new work, installed in the woodland behind the loch, which imagines the flight path of birds as augurs, or omens, part of an ancient tradition of divination by birds. This new project was made in collaboration with a former hunter turned bird guide in the Brazilian Atlantic Rainforest.
  
• Poet and artist Alec Finlay will read poems beneath a wind turbine reached through the woodland.
• Brazilian artist Camila Sposati will create a vast smoke drawing, Yellow Vanishing Point, across the horizon of the fell, tracing the landscape, perspectives and contours of the hills, in an ephemeral performance that dissolves into the ether.
• Participatory flying of 'suprematist kites' by artist, Susanne Norregard Nielsen, suitable for those with kite-flying experience.

Open Air meal at HICA 5-8pm
£10 (£5 for under 14s) in advance or £12 cash on the day. Please indicate whether you need vegetarian food.

The Territory of the Air, HICA 6-7.30pm.  Free progamme of talks by artists about the military/industrial and aerospace presence in remote places such as Scotland.

• Artist, Louise K Wilson will discuss her Spadeadam project in which she attempted to trace the remains of Britain's cancelled space programme, Blue Streak
• Gair Dunlop will provide insights into his photographic and video work relating to contemporary archaeology of the airfield and his forthcoming project at the nuclear reactor Dounreay
• Esther Polak will talk about the implications and possibilities of increased civilian uses of GPS technologies
• Claudia Zeiske, Director, Deveron Arts and cultural activist will talk about Walking and Art, in relation to Huntly’s Walking Festival and the recent residency at Deveron arts by Hamish Fulton

SUNDAY 19 SEPTEMBER
Perambulatory bus tour of the Great Glen, 10am-5pm
Perambulatory bus tour of the Great Glen, conducted by artist Adam Dant, in conversation with The Arts Catalyst curator Rob La Frenais.  This day-long event takes place along the length of the spectacular glen and will reveal unusual and possibly hidden aspects of Loch Ness and the Caledonian canal with the aid of an ‘aerial map’ new map, Biblioteque Outlandia, devised by Dant.  

The climax of the journey will be the arrival at and the first public unveiling of Outlandia, the tree house for artists, which will be inhabited by Adam Dant in the manner of the Scottish enlightenment. Dant will be the first of many artists to transform the Utopian aerial studio, devised and designed by London Fieldworks as a long-term artists project for Fort William. 

The Great Glen Artists’ Airshow is a very special participatory weekend event. Capacity is limited so please register and indicate when booking which events you will be taking part in - the Saturday daytime events, evening talks and Sunday bus tour.  Bus tickets must be pre-booked and cost £15 (£10 concessions) and £10 for lunch (if you are travelling independently please book a lunch-only ticket at £10)

Participants should be aware that some walking on steep, boggy and uneven ground at both Loch Ruthven and Glen Nevis.  There will be some climbing over fences and up steep inclines - fitness, suitable footwear and clothing will be needed.

We will be sending out suggestions for accommodation and options for travel and bus pick ups from Inverness station and airport in the next couple of weeks.

Presented by The Arts Catalyst in association with HICA and is supported by:

Arts Council England, Scottish Arts Council, Henry Moore Foundation, Highland Culture Fund, Brazilian Ministry of Culture, Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, Highlands and Islands Enterprise, H2007, Highland Council and Nevis Partnership

Images: View of Loch Ruthven from the Highland Institute of Contemporary Art. Photo: Jan van der Ploeg. Rescue Smoke, Camila  Sposati