Polar Wall of Ice Shortlisted for Award

An Antarctic Anthology to commemorate International Polar Year by book artist Rachel Hazell is one of twenty two projects shortlisted for this year’s Scottish Arts Council Creative Scotland Awards.

Musicians, new media artists, writers, visual artists and poets are among the shortlist for the lottery-funded awards which were initiated in 2000 to reward, honour and celebrate Scotland’s leading artists and help raise the profile of the arts by providing up to ten of Scotland’s most talented artists with £30,000 to realise their creative ideas in a major project.

Explaining her project Rachel said “The plan is to create a book about Antarctica to commemorate International Polar Year 2007/8: A combination of fiction, history and science interleaved with art. A series of presentations and workshops Scotland-wide will be accompanied by an interactive Ice Cliff made from paper - folk can jot down their thoughts and hopes for the continent and add to the 'wall of ice' book sculpture. An anthology that is not only topical and informative, but beautiful as well!

“Being shortlisted for this award is an enormous confidence boost which flings me up the scale of what is creatively possible. And because the project proposal is collaborative, it's more than a personal thrill.”

Graham Berry, chief executive of the Scottish Arts Council said  “The Creative Scotland Awards provide artists with the opportunity to experiment across artforms, develop new collaborations, expand their skills and realise their creative visions in a major project, helping to raise the profile of the arts in Scotland.

“The calibre of applications this year was of an extremely high standard and it is fantastic to see such a diverse range of projects on the shortlist, demonstrating the strength of artistic talent in this country.”

The recipients of this year’s awards will be announced at a ceremony in Glasgow in March.