Anne Bevan: RSA Residency Scotland

Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop is delighted to welcome Scottish artist Anne Bevan for a four-week residency as part of the RSA Residencies for Scotland Programme. During her residency, Bevan will develop a new project, BLUE PRINT, which explores the past, present, and future of marine energy. Collaborating with marine scientists, engineers, and local communities, she will work closely with EMEC (the European Marine Energy Centre, based in Stromness) and other organizations in the field. Drawing from archives, equipment, and installations—from the industry’s inception to its current advancements—she will use sculpture, printmaking, video, and sound to capture both the imaginative wonder and the environmental significance of this work beneath and alongside the waves.
Throughout her career, Bevan has been deeply interested in using creative methods to uncover new ways of understanding the marine environment, tracing its hidden particles, patterns, and processes. Her work often reveals the unseen—those aspects of place and practice that emerge through making and material transformation. She develops projects through sculpture, photography, video, performative events, and socially engaged art, frequently collaborating with artists, writers, composers, scientists, archaeologists, and engineers. Born in Orkney, she continues to live and work there today.

Artists Biography

Bevan has exhibited widely across the UK and internationally. Select projects include:

2016–2017: Orkney: Beside the Ocean of Time – Artist-in-residence for an interdisciplinary project incorporating the Orkney Festival of Deep Time, participatory walking events, and a solo exhibition (Walking the Sound, Pier Arts Centre, Stromness).

2015: Tang – A public artwork for Stromness Primary School featuring a constructed copper sculpture, video, and workshops on marine ecologies and energy, commissioned by Orkney Islands Council.

2009–2013: Things Unseen, Things Unspoken – A series of solo and group exhibitions with an accompanying publication in collaboration with Andrea Roe and five poets. Venues included the Royal British Society of Sculptors (London), Pier Arts Centre (Orkney), Taigh Chearsabhagh Art Gallery (North Uist), Bonhoga Gallery and Shetland Museum, the Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh (SeaChange), Aberdeen Maritime Museum, and RMIT Gallery (Melbourne, Australia, Ocean Imaginaries).

2004 (2008/2018/2019): Rosengarten – A solo exhibition and book in collaboration with writer Janice Galloway, now part of the permanent collection at the Hunterian Museum, Glasgow.

2000: Undercover – A solo exhibition at the Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh, accompanied by the book Pipelines, created in collaboration with Janice Galloway.

You can find out more about her work here 

This Residency has been generously supported by the Royal Scottish Academy’s Residency Scotland Programme. You can find out more about this programme here.