Striking artworks inspired by climate activism, colonial legacies and environmental research are on display in a free public exhibition.
The exhibition, opening at our Main Library on today, is the first of its kind to explore environmental issues through the University’s art collection.
The exhibition showcases more than 30 historic and contemporary works, across a range of media including painting, video, drawing, printed works and textiles. Collected by the University over hundreds of years, they are used to support and enhance present day research and learning.
The exhibition includes works by a range of world-renowned artists. These include Ian Hamilton Finlay, Joan Eardley, Hew Locke and Alberta Whittle, alongside a number of contemporary artists who are graduates of Edinburgh College of Art (ECA), including Katie Paterson, Daisy Lafarge and Ruth Ewan.
The next generation of leading artists are championed through works from recent ECA graduates including Clarissa Gurd, Ffion Williams and Valentina Lobos Muñoz.
Art and Activism
The exhibition sparks conversations between art, research and activism by addressing different types of environmental impacts or emergencies.
Thomas Abercromby’s video work Rocabarraigh is inspired by Greenpeace climate activists’ occupation of Atlantic islet of Rockall in 1997, part of a campaign to protect the surrounding seas from new oil drilling contracts.
Valentina Lobos Muñoz’s Speculative Flag addresses a different kind of environmental impact. Using digital printing on silk, she offers an alternative perspective to how land, nature, and people have often been considered as resources or commodities, through a work that incorporates images of plants, animals, and figures from the coats of arms and heraldry of over 60 countries.
Taking inspiration from the meaning of ‘rooting’ – to grow, begin, or connect – our exhibition invites visitors to consider the entwined stories of art, history and nature across time and different artforms. We are really excited to been able to showcase art works from the collection in this unique way and look forward to the conversations we hope it sparks with visitors around some of the most pressing issues facing the world today.
Artists with academics
Featured artists have also partnered with academics to inform their practice and exchange ideas. Clarissa Gurd’s Caddisfly Larvae details a microscopic image of a caddisfly larva from the River Esk, near Edinburgh, produced using ink made from samples of iron oxide, a pollutant collected from the same site.
Gurd worked with Professor Margaret Graham from the University’s Environmental Geochemistry department to research her piece and learn about the role of the Caddisfly in testing water health.
Sustainable support
The exhibition features audio and interactive elements, which highlight several research, teaching and operational programmes across the University that are contributing to a more sustainable future.
Information about the University’s Forest and Peatlands programme is displayed next to Scottish artist Katie Paterson’s Future Library, one of the most unique works in the University’s collection.
By partnering with Heritage Collections for this exhibition, we aim to showcase current research, teaching and operational projects that are creating a more sustainable future to a wider audience, surfacing connections to the artworks.
Paterson has planted a forest near Oslo, Norway, with the intention that the trees will eventually provide the paper for a collection of books to be printed in 2114. Each year for 100 years, one author contributes a text for the collection, starting with Margaret Atwood in 2014.
The Forest and Peatlands programme reflects the themes of Paterson's art, through its work to restore peatland and expand forests in Scotland. The project will remove carbon from the atmosphere, increase biodiversity, connect woodlands, improve recreation and scenery for local communities and preserve cultural heritage sites.
A recently announced partnership with Kinloch Woodlands is the first in Scotland where a university will help to deliver natural capital benefits, social and economic advantages from nature to a community landowner, repairing what was previously taken from the land and its people.
Monday 27 January to Saturday 15 November 2025, 10am - 6pm Ground Floor Exhibition Space, University of Edinburgh Library, 30 George Square, Edinburgh, EH8 9LJ
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