Graduate show set to sparkle at art festival exhibition

Magical adventures, identity, sustainable designs and nostalgic comics are some of the themes running through the extraordinary work of more than 350 postgraduate students that will be displayed during a week-long exhibition.

Visitors to the August Graduate Show will be offered a glimpse of a new era of talent, spanning the disciplines of art, design and architecture and landscape architecture.

The August Graduate Show is free to enter and is open to the public from Saturday 17 August - Friday 23 August at the ECA Main Building on Lauriston Place.

Captivating creations

Through colourful paintings and sculptures, Remi Jablecki has taken inspiration from the natural world to explore highly personal themes of hidden identity, belonging and queerness.

The artist charts his experiences through abstract oil paintings of snails, stick insects and weeds, alongside a series of aluminium creatures depicting sprouting potatoes and gherkins.

Maggie Carrol has created a series of whimsical illustrations for a new graphic novel. Sabrina McKay and the Cerulean World tells the magical story of an adventurous 11-year-old girl and her dog, Tomino, living in a village on the north east coast of Scotland in the 1950s.

Elsewhere, Kezia Greenwood has designed a collection of set pieces for a theatre play. The artist’s creations are inspired by the Chimera, a hybrid monster from ancient Greek mythology merging animal and human forms.

Audience interaction

Augmented reality brings childhood nostalgia to life in design and digital media student Lea Fevrier’s creation. Using an immersive, 3D-web experience, visitors can explore the classic comic series, Tintin, through interactive quizzes and stories.

Shun Guo, Yilin Hu, Yunxi Lu and Shuomeng Zhang’s interactive design, Youself, invites visitors to explore self-identity and how this is influenced by social norms by passing through a striking red archway.

Climate conscious

Sustainability is the focus of Brandon LeNoir’s Design for Decomposition. Brandon refashions a lamp out of rice paper-gelatine composite to test a concept that could see biodegradable materials being used in household objects to help reuse certain components once an object is at the end of its lifespan.

The sustainability theme continues with Luowen Kong‘s interesting take on the environmental impact of beef consumption. Through an interactive game-like experience, visitors can use a set of scales to counterbalance cows’ carbon footprint with eco-friendly – and often amusingly impossible – actions.

Thought-provoking perspectives

Inspired by her own experiences, Maryam Haddadi’s documentary film explores the impact of compulsory hijab in Iran, blending personal memories with abstract imagery.

Through extensive research, archival exploration and intimate storytelling, the film captures the emotional and psychological struggle for women's rights.

Yongwei Chen’s sculpture uses a pound sign, roses, diamond jewellery and chocolates to represent each letter in the word “love”. The Measure Of Love, is a comment on how people use material items as a way to prove the strength of their feelings towards others.

August festivals

The August Graduate Show is part of the Edinburgh Art Festival, the UK's largest annual celebration of visual art, which attracts audiences from around the world.

Since its launch in 2004, the Festival has featured exhibitions, events and presentations of visual art from major figures in the arts world, alongside emerging artists and designers.

The Graduate Show Exhibition is a culmination of months of hard work and is an opportunity to celebrate our students’ achievements. Our August show is part of the Edinburgh Art Festival programme and will offer the city’s festival goers with a unique opportunity to discover innovative and inspiring new work from our students.

Professor Juan Cruz

EAF are pleased to work with Edinburgh College of Art to help showcase the incredible work of these graduates. We are committed to supporting young creatives as they begin their careers, and being able to present their designs in a festival setting offers an invaluable opportunity to connect with a broader audience. We wish the graduates every success in their future and look forward to seeing where their talent takes them.

Kim McAleese

Related links

ECA August Graduate Show 2024 | Edinburgh College of Art

_{Image credit - Neil Hanna}