Scottish Art at Frieze London

By Gemma Batchelor, 09.10.2020

Alberta Whittle, Still from RESET, 2020. Photo credit: Matthew Williams.

Today sees the opening of Frieze London, normally the busiest time of the year in the London art world, noticed throughout the city’s galleries and surrounding Regents Park. This year, however, it has taken a different form as the main event is taking place online, through the Frieze Online Viewing Room.

Alongside the artworks on offer, in-depth talks between artists, curators and specialists, as well as artist films, are available to view online, making it tricky to know where to start (much the same as when entering the usual 40,000 square meter space of fair stalls in person).

And it isn’t all virtual. Alongside this digital art world, galleries and artists across London are holding physical exhibitions in a Covid-secure manner for those who can safely travel. From both settings, whether to be experiences from our home office or around the streets of Mayfair, we've highlighted some of the Scottish art that we are most excited to see.

 

Ingleby Gallery At Cromwell Place, 10th - 11th October & Frieze Online Viewing Room, 9^th – 16^th October

The Edinburgh based gallery is presenting a selection of artwork at the newly opened Cromwell Place, an arts hub in South Kensington. The physical exhibition focuses on new painting from Scotland, including by artists Andrew Cranston, Kevin Harman, Lorna Robertson and Caroline Walker. Their online presentation goes further afield and also presents other media.

Alberta Whittle: RESET At Forma HQ. Screening 9th-16th October

Described by the artist as "a space for quiet, a space for reflection", RESET is a new film created by the winner of the 2020 Frieze Artist Award and Glasgow-based artist Alberta Whittle, commissioned by and to be shown at Forma HQ, Bermondsey. The moving-image work is informed by the writings of Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, a theorist of gender studies and queer theory, bringing in fears of contagion, xenophobia and moral panic to explore timely questions.

The Modern Institute Frieze Online Viewing Room, 9^th – 16^th October

The Glasgow based gallery is presenting a selection of artists, including artwork by South Lanarkshire born Martin Boyce, as part of their online viewing room. The work shown includes a piece from his series on masks, exploring the many meanings of a face covering (some of them all too relevant at the moment), how it remains an active object even when discarded and its evocation of the fear of the Other. Artworks by Cathy Wilkes, Jim Lambie and Hayley Tompkins are also on display

Koppe Astner Frieze Online Viewing Room, 9th – 16th October & at saf05.com, 7^th – 21^st October

Online, Koppe Astner, another Glasgow based gallery, has created space for new works by a selection of queer and female voices which have been traditionally overshowed. Leanne Ross is one such artist being presented, whose ‘shout out’ poster paintings record snippets of conversations from the Midlothian KMAdotcom studio, a space which brings together artists with and without learning disabilities. Additionally, Koppe Astner, in collaboration with Hollybush Gardens, brings ‘SaF05’, the work with which Charlotte Prodger represented Scotland at the 2019 Venice Biennale, to audiences online for the first time.

For more information about Frieze London & Frieze Masters 2020 Edition and for free registration to the online event, visit Frieze Online Viewing Room, open 9^th – 16^th October.