Parks Department – Diane Dawson

A show of new prints exploring the relationship between municipal spaces, council-built environments, public spaces and the creatures that live and are exhibited in them.

As a child, Diane was one of the so-called ‘Glasgow overspill’, moving from her Glasgow home to a new town at the start of her secondary school years. In her early career she worked for several local authorities, often organising cultural events in parks, before attending Glasgow School of Art in 2006. Many years later she finds that she is still drawn to the themes form those early years. This exhibition gives a platform to Diane’s reflexive experience where she is curious about her feelings, reactions, and associations concerning the relationship between municipal spaces, council-built environments, public spaces and the creatures that live and are exhibited in them.

The focus for this work is on Parks as provided public spaces for free-play, health, events and recreation. When asked about her own experience of Parks as a child in the 1970s she fondly described them as ‘over-staffed and over strict’, not something that could be said in 2024. She also remembers Parks as places of celebration and belonging, and the motifs she uses in her work manage to convey this appreciation and joy. At the same time there are endearing but also disquieting images of creatures which have been given space or a home in park spaces but may be out of place.

In this exhibition of works in progress, Diane introduces a new series of reflections on the theme of Parks where she has experimented with different printing techniques and materials, specifically the use of glass, mirrors, layers and light sources. The choice of materials and adaptations to printing technique speaks directly to this new phase of work where Diane is exploring the relationship and the differences between the surface detail, often nothing more than a reflection, and the depth of the municipal experience.

Diane Dawson is a mid-career artist, who primarily works in painting and printmaking. Her subjects are usually creatures in environments, and the relationships that have been altered by humans. Throughout her work she finds the individual spark of personality, colour and optimism, against otherwise troubling or perplexing backgrounds.

Diane uses her paintings to find and engage with her themes and then employs the screen printing process to develop the concepts. For her, the detail and technical quality of the prints are a way of respecting the creatures and the possibilities they bring to the work, both as motifs and character actors in a fabricated narrative.

The viewer is invited to both reflect on our shared environmental responsibility and the individual spark of optimism that may be required to survive and change.

Diane is a graduate of Fine Art Painting & Printmaking from Glasgow School of Art, and since 2010, has maintained a studio practice with both WASPS and Glasgow Print Studio.