We have recently appointed for the first time an Artist in Residence, Brigid Collins who for the next year will use the garden and Tower for inspiration in her art work, carry out workshops in the Tower and hold an exhibition next May.
Brigid Collins is an Artist and Educator, based in Edinburgh. She came to Scotland to study Illustration as a post-graduate at Edinburgh College of Art from her home in Ireland, having studied in Dublin and worked as an Archaeological Illustrator on Viking excavations in the city of Waterford. Brigid now practices as a Visual Artist and is passionate about weaving poems and plants together in her work.
Alongside her Visual Art practice, Brigid is a visiting lecturer in the Illustration department at Edinburgh College of Art, course leader of the School’s Outreach Programme at Leith School of Art and External Examiner for the Art & Design Foundation course at The International College in the University of Dundee. She has also devised and led workshops with diverse groups, including at Cornton Vale women’s prison, with displaced Syrian women at The University of Stirling and with delegates at The Expressive Therapies Summit at UCLA, Los Angeles.
Having collaborated with poets of international acclaim, Brigid’s publications include Frissure (Polygon, 2013), in collaboration with award winning poet and essayist, Kathleen Jamie; For A’ That: A Celebration of Burns (2010) with contemporary poets and writers, including DBC Pierre and Kirsty Gunn; A place where thought happens (2006), with poet, Larry Butler and Jewellery Designer, Teena Ramsay and Room to Rhyme.