Summerhall

Summerhall arts hub, 2013

Summerhall is a multi-arts complex and events venue in Edinburgh, Scotland, and in the UK only London's Barbican Centre and Birmingham's MAC are comparable for multi-arts. It is directed by artist and economist Robert McDowell in the spirit of Heinrich Boell and Joseph Beuys's Free International University for Creativity and Interdisciplinary Research (FIU), which he was also a co-founder of in the 1970s, and to honour the founding principles of the Edinburgh International Festival begun in 1947. Summerhall is about 4% of Edinburgh's August festivals in which there are more than 2,500 performances and events each day for over 3 weeks. It is exceptional as a large arts venue functioning without direct grants or subsidies from the arts council, the city, government or corporate sponsors. It is Europe's biggest private arts centre. It is a mainly privately funded or self-funding arts centre. Formerly home to the veterinary school of the University of Edinburgh, it is a major part of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe with an August programme of c.200 productions each year with artists, performers and their shows chosen from c.30 countries. About 15% of shows each year win festival awards, higher than for other venues, alongside the highly acclaimed Traverse Theatre that also has year-round programming and not only at festival times.

Summerhall also hosts events for other festivals such as the Edinburgh Science Festival, and provides offices and studios for artists and organisations, most notably Richard Demarco and the Demarco European Art Foundation and Archive Trust. Summerhall's 600+ rooms are used for exhibitions, concerts, plays, libraries, small museums, educational and technology and other research programmes, studios, offices, labs and workshops. About 500 people work there, of which 100 work for Summerhall in arts programming and related activities, rising to 300 during the August festival. It receives annually nearly a million visitors and makes, co-produces or hosts over 1,300 shows and events with approximately 4,000 performances annually. There are eight theatres and over twenty exhibition spaces, and double this in July/August. One third of the complex is occupied by arts and technology tenants, two thirds are for arts presentations, productions, and support functions. There is a gastro-pub bar and café.

History

Early records show the Summerhall site was a farm, a cottage, and a family run brewery in the 1710s. All that remains of this brewery are a well and stone rubble sandstone boundary wall. Terraced houses, two churches, and shops occupied the site for many years, until they made way for the purpose-built Royal (Dick) Veterinary College, built during World War I, when the veterinary school moved there from North St Andrew Street and Clyde Street (now Multrees Walk) in the city centre. Summerhall retains many items on display from the veterinary school's history. Summerhall believe in adapting the arts to spaces to retain as much of the building's inherited character as possible. Most artists and theatre companies prefer exhibiting and performing in spaces with an explicit history rather than in clinically new or relatively soulless places and spaces.

Building the college at Summerhall began in 1913. It was the third home for the UK's second oldest veterinary school (1823) named in the 1860s after its founder Professor William Dick in response to nearby New Veterinary College. Dick was a former student of the anatomist John Barclay of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. On 21 July 1914, a memorial stone and time capsule were laid underneath the grand entrance steps. Work slowed on the outbreak of the First World War, due to a lack of labour as young men joined the armed forces. The veterinary college moved to the site in 1916, and the college was based in the main building and wings to the rear courtyard. The Anatomy Lecture Theatre, still extant, has wooden, curved, tiered seating and vaulted sky light. It is the last surviving example of this type of lecture theatre at veterinary colleges in the United Kingdom. Elsewhere on Summerhall's site, "TechCube" is a seven storey 1960s block of offices and laboratories at the corner of Summerhall and Hope Park Terrace. It replaced the Hope Park United Presbyterian Church by Edinburgh architects Peddie and Mackay. The church opened in September 1867. Its spire could be seen from a large distance, the height of which dictated the height of the veterinary school's tower block that replaced it. Summerhall's Hope Park and Buccleuch Congregational Church, built in 1876, was originally designed to seat 730. The university in the 1980s sadly eviscerated the original internally. It now provides spaces for Rose Bruford Theatre School, a UN Gaia Education project office, an art stuidio, galley, and a radio drama theatre.

The college became a full faculty of the University of Edinburgh in 1964, and continues as that in the 21st century at its new campus (Europe's largest veterinary campus) at Easter Bush to the southwest of the city. The vets vacated Summerhall in 2011 when it was acquired by the McDowell family with the deal finalized at precisely 11 minutes past 11 o'clock on the 11th day of the 11th month of the 11th year with 2 minutes silence in memory of war dead.

The Demarco European Art Foundation occupies the southern wing of the main building. Summerhall's first Edinburgh Festival programme was in August 2011. In 2012, Summerhall opened fully to the public to provide festival arts all year round. Summerhall and its programmes have gained over one hundred critical prizes and awards in its first five years and been featured in BBC and other television and radio channels and has its own online Summerhall.tv. A dozen films have been shot on site. Summerhall attracts about 500 media reviews annually.

About half of all shows and artists are from outside Scotland and at least half from outside UK, many from the contemporary world's trouble-spots and war zones including journalists, photographers, film-makers, visual artists, dancers, musicians, singers and theatre companies. Each Summerhall festival has artists from 30-40 countries.

As well as operating as an arts centre, the building houses many artists, technologists and other creative enterprises including a microbrewery (Barney's Beer) and gin distillery (Pickerings). In its first five years thousands of artists have shown and performed at Summerhall in all art forms.

External links

• Official website