Dressing Above Your Station

Wed 12 June 2019

CCA, Sauchiehall Street, Glasgow.

We are delighted to share this wonderful recording of our recent Steven Campbell Annual Lecture at CCA, Glasgow.

In what proved to be a very well attended and compelling event, Beca Lipscombe and Mairi MacKenzie looked at the life and work of Steven, considering what it means to dress for the life you want rather than dress for the life you have. They reflected upon Campbell’s depiction of textiles and clothing as well as his personal wardrobe, in order to recount their own aspirations growing up in Scotland and the routes they took in an attempt to develop a vernacular panache.

Beca Lipscombe is a fashion and textile designer and one half of Atelier E.B. Mairi MacKenzie is a fashion historian and Research Fellow in Fashion and Textiles at Glasgow School of Art.

Our sincere thanks go to Beca and Mairi for their research towards this excellent presentation in CCA, and for coordinating filming of this fantastic event and sharing this with us.

Click on link below for credits for video lecture and video production:

Credits for Steven Campbell Lecture, CCA, Glasgow, 2019

Our thanks also to Beca for sharing images of Steven’s work from her recent research of Paisley Museums’ Collections.

To see in hi-res click on images below.

This life size portrait is a counterpart to Steven Campbell’s allegorical, amalgamated portrait of John Byrne, ‘Paisleycus Byrnicus Virus Invading Mr Gray, also Art Funded in 2006.

The painting is a physical and psychological likeness of a fellow artist and professional admirer.

This work was painted as Campbell was nervously awaiting a visit to the studio of John Byrne in Nairn.

John Byrne was born in Paisley and Campbell uses the Paisley pattern with references to Velasquez. First there is the device of a painting within a painting which echoes the work ‘Las Meninas’ and there is an allusion to Velasquez’ self portrait in the top right corner. Byrne’s Picasso-inspired shorthand inspired the little heraldic-looking dog, taken again from Velasquez. Byrne’s diverse practice made him something of a hero to Campbell.