April 8, 2020
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After seeing GSA Exhibitions recent call-out for exhibition publicity from previous years, Jim Rafferty, a GSA alumnus, got in touch. He tells the story behind the exhibition poster for ‘Divergence’, a student exhibition in 1964 that took place in Newbery Gallery, The Glasgow School of Art.
‘This exhibition included the work of myself and seven other peers at GSA. I studied under Robert Stewart (1924 – 1995) in Textiles at Glasgow School of Art. I was a student at GSA from 1960-64.
A little bit about the others featured on the poster. My wife Rosemary did Ceramics (or Pottery as it was termed then) with Johnny Crawford. She went on to become Head of Art at Tunbridge Wells Girls’ Grammar and is now retired and painting every day. Ian Clydesdale did Textiles also.
Dirk Buwalda (1947-2009) has sadly passed on, but spent a year at GSA on a general course. He became Bruce McLean’s photographer in the late 60s’ (‘Pieces and Poses: Dirk Buwalda Photographs Bruce McLean 1965-2008’, Buwalda, D, McLean, B, De Verbeelding Publishers, 2009), before returning to his native Holland. Charlie Boyle went to Australia where he became a successful painter. Tam Murray studied Graphics but we lost touch after graduation.
Jimmy Leggat is a successful painter & we see him regularly. Eddie Chisnall we didn’t see after graduation but I believe he too continued as a painter. Robert Burns who took the photos is still in touch and went on to be a successful photographer and is still active.
And me? I’ve had a number of creative careers as artist / designer / Art Director / songwriter & singer with three albums to my name, and currently still an active graphic designer & songwriter.
The ‘Divergence‘ show was mounted largely to demonstrate that our generation at GSA had already absorbed a number of the prevailing new artistic currents of the ‘60’s. We were anxious to demonstrate to our lecturers that their ideas & creative philosophies had begun to seem a trifle… inappropriate. This not to say that the grounding we were receiving at GSA in the traditional practices of Life Drawing & Painting / Still Life etc. went unappreciated – far from it. We merely wanted to take those same disciplines into other and more challenging directions.
The use of the participants’ photographs on the poster came directly from the fact that photographers, this being The Sixties, had become iconic figures: David Bailey / Terence Donovan / & Robert Freeman. Freeman had photographed The Beatles for the cover of their second album in a style which echoed the early Hamburg photographs of the group by Astrid Kirchner in a moody, side-lit manner & which went on to have wide influence of its own. Add to this the appearance of Asahi Pentax 35mm cameras, at a price which students could just about afford and which were viewed as a must have accessory and a major signifier that you were young, hip and right up there with the movers & shakers.
THIS was A Time to be young and at Art School.
It seems now, in retrospect to my generation of art school graduates, that some of the fire and revolutionary fervour has tended to dissipate in these more conservative & cash strapped times. Having said that, I was fortunate, given my working class background & the first of my family to pursue any kind of continuing education after leaving secondary school in my hometown of Paisley at the age of fifteen. I submitted a portfolio of work in ‘59 to GSA and was accepted & awarded a grant. This opened up a life changing experience for me & I relished every second of the four years spent within the confines of The Art School. During this period I made great friends & met my wife Rosemary, to whom I am still very happily married.
In retrospect, having been asked whether there was a key thing I learnt at GSA, it seems from my present perspective that if you should be fortunate to possess any kind of creative drive, follow it with as much resolve and dedication as you can muster, and if you do it may open up the most surprising & unexpected avenues.
I’ve been fortunate in my life to pursue pretty much all of the creative areas in which I had interest and ability and I am exceedingly grateful to have had all of the opportunities which have come my way as a result. Being a student at GSA was the bedrock for all of this. Great days indeed.’
