text: Travelling Gallery is pleased to announce its 2023 programme which takes a new approach to touring with environmental concerns and community partnerships at the heart of it.
  Under the annual theme of ‘care’ Travelling Gallery will tour for three seasons to different geographical clusters inviting local partners to invest in a long-term commitment to bringing our exhibitions to their communities.
  Season one hits the road in March 2023 with the exhibition To avoid falling apart by Emmie McLuskey and Janice Parker made especially for Travelling Gallery. This two-person show explores and illuminates our human capacity for mutuality, connection and interdependence through movement, language, and film.
  Together Emmie and Janice have developed a movement workshop in collaboration with an invited mix of friends and colleagues. From this they will create several short films focusing on the active state of counterbalance – the physical act of two or more human bodies leaning against or leaning away from each other. The films will invite the viewer to witness shared and reciprocal acts of support, capturing the details and nuances of these movements in the moment as they dynamically unfold between people.
  Accompanying the films, will be a series of sculptural apparatus that invite visitors into the simple acts of resting, weight-bearing, and capacity for counterbalance; and a collection of hand-written texts created by the artists in response to the workshop and the films.
  Both artists bring to the Travelling Gallery their shared interest in how we live together and how we experience our moving bodies in society; asking what might happen if we led with our movement and our ordinary/extraordinary human bodies.
  Launching in Edinburgh on Calton Hill on Friday 10 March the exhibition will tour to the following locations:
  16 – 18 March 2023, Aberdeen in partnership with Aberdeen City Council
  23 – 25 March 2023, Angus in partnership with Hospitalfield
  30 March – 1 April 2023, Aberdeenshire in partnership with Live Life Aberdeenshire
  4 – 6 April 2023, Dundee in partnership with DCA
  w/c 17 April 2023, Highlands in partnership with TimeSpan
  25 – 28 April 2023, Orkney in partnership with Orkney Islands Council
  3 – 5 May 2023 Perth & Kinross in partnership with Perth & Kinross Council
  After the Covid-19 pandemic Travelling Gallery is excited and energised to be launching its new touring model. We can only provide inclusive and equal access to art with good partnerships and we are delighted to have such a wealth of long-term partners for 2023 and beyond.
  Emmie McLuskey and Janice Parker’s fantastic new work is the perfect way to kickstart our annual year of ‘care’. The exhibition explores connections and strength in our movement and bodies which can often be lost in our daily hustle and bustle. I can’t wait for our audience to see the artwork and hear what they think.”
  Claire Craig, Curator of Travelling GalleryIt’s fantastic to be launching the 2023 programme for the Travelling Gallery at Calton Hill. To avoid falling apart promises to be a fascinating exhibition that will inspire us all to think about our ordinary/extraordinary bodies and how we connect to others in society.
  It is so important to make art and culture as accessible as possible to a variety of people, and through our ongoing support of the Travelling Gallery, art is brought straight into the hearts of town centres. I hope everyone takes the opportunity to pay the spring exhibition a visit.
  Councillor Val Walker, Edinburgh’s Culture and Communities Convener